Employment Scenario in India

The sectoral allocation of personnel in India during the period 1983 to 2004 - 05 discloses that the structural alterations in terms of employment have been dawdling in India as the primary segment continued to absorb 56.67 percent of the total workforce even in 2004 - 05, followed by the tertiary and the industrial sectors, 24.62% & 18.70% respectively. There has been uneven augmentation of tertiary sector, as its contribution in employment has been far less when evaluated to its contribution to Gross Domestic Product.

It is significant to point out that, within the services sector the employment growth rate is maximum in insurance, finance, & business services, followed by trade, restaurants, hotels & transport etc. The community personal & social services take up the last rank in growth rates of employment.

Further, there was a quick plunge in labour absorptive capacity of growth in the economy from 0.40 to 0.15 for the period of post –reform, originally, reflecting the observable fact of jobless growth. On the other hand, during 1999 - 2000 to 2004 – 05 the employment elasticity of growth listed an increase from 0.15 to 0.51.With the exemption of one sub - sector of tertiary sector all other sub - sectors of services sector showed signs of an increasing trend in employment elasticities and thus overall elasticity of employment augmented from 0.15 to 0.51.