By Poorvi Gupta

New Delhi, Jan. 7, 2019: India saw a major job crunch in 2018, according to a report by Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy.

The total number of jobs lost last year was 11 million. One of the major findings of the report is that the job crisis affected women the worst. About 8.8 million women lost jobs in comparison to only 2.2 million men.

During the year 6.5 million rural women lost jobs, nearly the total population of Himachal Pradesh. Their urban counterparts lost only 2.3 million jobs, slightly less than the Meghalaya population.

However, the report says urban men actually gained 500,000 jobs while their rural counterparts lost 2.3 million jobs.

“An estimated 9.1 million jobs were lost in rural India while the loss in urban India was 1.8 million jobs. Rural India accounts for two-thirds of India’s population, but it accounted for 84 percent of the job losses,” the report stated.

The report also warned that increasingly, the number of jobs is diminishing in the country as the total number of employed people in December 2018 was 397 million, which is 10.9 million less than the figure seen a year ago at the end of December 2017.

The report also viewed the job loss trend from the point of age group and found that the safest age group is 40 to 59 years as people in this category retained their jobs the most while all other age groups seem hit by the job crisis scenario.

Salaried employees who lost their jobs in 2018 account for 3.7 million people and it hugely impacted uneducated people, wage laborers, agricultural laborers and small traders. Wage laborers, agricultural laborers and small traders also suffered a huge blow in the aftermath of demonetization.

The profile of the person who lost the job in 2018 would read like this: a woman, particularly in rural India. She is an uneducated daily wager, a farm laborers or a small-scale trader. She is under 40 years or more than 60 years, the report said.

“India’s unemployment rate shot up to 7.4 percent in December 2018. This is the highest unemployment rate we’ve seen in 15 months. The rate has increased sharply from the 6.6 percent clocked in November,” the report added.

While the overall trend shows a steep decline in jobs, there are a few variations. September and December saw volatile employment estimates despite the fact that month after month employment estimates have increased or declined by 5-7 million.

(Source: shethepeople.tv)