Andhra Pradesh, Telangana have best jobs

Hyderabad: AP, Telangana state, Maharashtra and Chhattisgarh lead the states in the quality and quantity of jobs they provide to their people, while Bihar, Odisha and Uttar Pradesh are last, said a survey done by the Centre for Policy Research (CPR).

AP and TS together secured the top position with 57.3 points, followed by Maharashtra with 57.2 and Chattisgarh 56.39, while UP is below Bihar at 37.28 and Odisha with 37.70 at last.

While creating the index, each state was analysed on indicators such as employment, formality, benefits, income equality, and gender equality, which were given equal weight.

Researchers observed the data released by government organisations such as the National Sample Survey Organisation, the Labour Bureau, the Annual Survey of Industries, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) and the recently-released Periodic Labour Force Survey (PLFS) by the ministry of statistics and programme implementation. According to the survey, “Andhra Pradesh’s high scores for employment and gender equality, coupled with average scores in the three remaining dimensions, have helped it to the top rank.” High unemployment rates among females in particular, made Goa (13.9) and Kerala (11.4), the worst performers in employment rates.

The survey revealed that despite economic growth, the pace of job creation has been slow and inconsistent.

In 2017-18, rural and urban unemployment rates of India were 5.3 per cent and 7.8 per cent respectively.

The World Bank has ranked India in the 120th place among 131 countries in female labour force participation rates. The PLFS data of 2017-18 shows that fewer than one in four women of 15 years and above (23.3 per cent) enter the labour market. Small states like Himachal Pradesh (72.9 per cent) topped in gender equality, while Bihar (13.5 per cent) ranked at the bottom.

The reason for the high index values of states like AP and TS is better facilities to workers and safeguarding their rights by providing pension, insurance, higher expenditure on pension as part of gross state domestic product and a higher share of workers with pension/provident funds.

Experts said that such surveys can underpin policies of the central and state governments while formulating employment strategies.

Reacting to the survey, Dr Devendra Pant, an economist, said, “In the recent scenario, we cannot rely on the traditional way of computing a survey. We have to take the changes happening because of technology. There has been an enormous amount of labour generation and displacement such as cab drivers, food and ecommerce delivery agents which stay unaccounted in our surveys.”