Context: The Periodic Labour Force Survey PLFS (2019-20) points towards the steady build-up of distress in the labour market in India.
Concerning highlights of the PLFS 2019-20
Increase in the labour force participation in agriculture: This implies that during this period of stress, agriculture emerged as an “employer of last resort”.
Share of the labour force engaged in agriculture rose to 45.6 per cent in 2019-20, up from 42.5 per cent in 2018-19.
Data on work demanded by households under MGNREGA indicates that the stress in the labour market remains higher than in pre-Covid times
Increase women work informalisation: There has been an increase in the women labour force participation rate in the unpaid family labour and not in more productive forms of employment.
While the increase is good considering the low female participation (24.5 %), however, the rise in unpaid family work.
The employment rate for unpaid workers in the household enterprises in rural and urban areas increased to 15.9 per cent in 2019-20, from 13.3 per cent in 2018-19.
In the case of female workers, it increased from 30.9 per cent to 35 per cent over the period.