‘One in three formally trained youth unemployed’

Around 33% of formally trained youth were unemployed in 2017-18, reveals the Periodic Labour Force Survey (PLFS) 2017-18 recently released by the ministry of statistics and programme implementation.

An analysis of the unit-level data from the survey says that the unemployment rate among freshly-trained youth, or those who completed their training during the previous year, was even higher at 40%.

The PLFS replaces the old employment/unemployment survey (EUS) by the National Sample Survey Office which came out last in 2012. Coming after roughly six years, the data stated that the share of workers employed in regular salaried jobs in the country's workforce rose just 5% between 2011-12 and 2017-18.

At least 45% of regular workers in India earned less than ₹10,000 a month during the survey period (2017-18); around 12% of workers got less than ₹5,000 a month, the survey data revealed.

Among regular female employees, 63% earned less than ₹10,000 a month during the same period and 32% of them were earning less than ₹5,000.

In rural areas 55% of total regular workers earned less than ₹10,000 a month and in urban areas, 38%.

The PLFS said that around 3% of regular workers constituted the “well-off” category earning ₹50,000- ₹1,00,000 per month as salary. Those who made over ₹1 lakh a month were just 0.2% of the country's aggregate workforce.

Self-employment was the major income source for 52.2% rural households and 32.4% urban ones.

Last year, only 1.8% of the population received formal vocational/technical training (more than half of this were youth), while 5.6% reported receiving informal vocational training (either self-taught, or on-the-job training). “But about 42% of the youth (15-29 years) who received formal technical training were not part of the labour force,” the survey said.

More than 80% of trainees in agriculture, food processing, telecom, media and mass communication were men, while women dominated in the fields of beauty, wellness, apparel, handicrafts, hospitality and healthcare.