The share of women in regular salaried jobs in urban India dropped from 54% in the first quarter (April to June 2023) to 52.8% in the second quarter (July to September), according to quarterly Periodic Labour Force Survey (PLFS) data, Business Standard reported.
That's is the lowest it has been in any quarter since Q3 of FY19 (the National Statistical Office started releasing the quarterly PLFS data six years ago). Its peak was 61.2% in Q1 of FY21.
The survey showed that the share of women who are self-employed and doing casual work increased to 40.3% in Q2 from 39.2% in Q1, while that of casual workers increased marginally to 6.9% in Q2 from 6.8% in Q1.
Since salaried workers receive regular wages, that type of work is preferred to casual work or self-employment, which also includes working as unpaid household help in agricultural fields or owning a tiny business. It’s useful here to understand how the PLFS defines three categories of self-employed people.
- Own-account workers: Self-employed people who operate their enterprises on their own or with one or more partners and who, by and large, do not hire any labour. They may, however, have unpaid helpers.
- Employers: Self-employed people who work on their own or with one or more partners and who, by and large, hire labour.
- Helpers in a household enterprise: Self-employed people engaged in household enterprises, working full-time or part-time, who do not receive a regular salary. They do not run the enterprise on their own and receive help from people living in the same household.
In the current Indian context, non-salaried work is often a distress option that workers fall back on after failing to find salaried work. This is especially true of ‘unpaid’ workers.
Some economists, such as those at the State Bank of India, have interpreted the rise in self-employment differently. According to them, improved education among women and increased access to credit through government schemes such as MUDRA allow them to be self-employed and become entrepreneurs.
But these arguments defy logic. Government schemes for loans, including MUDRA, target borrowers in the informal sector. These units are typically run by households and don’t create the kind of salaried jobs that are considered formal-sector employment. They are more likely to cause an increase in unpaid work, especially for women. It's more likely that women are shifting from salaried jobs to such activities because of distress rather than increased access to credit.
Remember that the annual PLFS results, which were released in October, showed that the share of women doing unpaid work had increased. It also showed that the share of women among ‘employers’ – those who create jobs – is less than 1%.
There’s no doubt that if more women were in formal jobs, the pay-off for India’s economy would be enormous. But the increase in education has not led to an increase in salaried jobs for women, which shows the economy is not creating enough salaried jobs, and that employers retain their preference for men.
India’s economy, despite rapid economic growth, has chronically failed to create formal, productive jobs at a pace quick enough to absorb more Indians, both men and women. This has been termed the “jobless growth” problem. It also leads to women losing out in the job market.
With many more job-seekers than jobs available, employers can drive a hard bargain with all workers. Women come off worse as employers prefer to hire men, who won’t need to take maternity leave or require extra security during their commute.
Even in the corporate sector, female professionals tend to give up their careers as they have little scope for career progression when companies don’t expand quickly. Corporate jobs aren’t growing in a big way, and those that exist are not going to women, especially at senior levels. The absence of a level playing field between men and women at the workplace pushes even qualified women into informal sectors.