Fewer people look for jobs in Andhra Pradesh

Visakhapatnam: The unemployment rate in AP has declined steadily in the first three months of the year, due to job-seekers being discouraged by unavailability of jobs post-demonetisation.

The unemployment rate recorded in AP was 5.81 in January, 4.54 in February and 3.83 in March. In rural areas, it was 5.46, 5.01 and 2.79 in January, February and March respectively. 

Gujarat has the lowest unemployment rate, according to the monthly survey reports conducted by Bombay Stock Exchange, Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE) and University of Michigan.

The BSE is collecting data from 1,58,000 households, covering 3,000 locations from all states including AP and observing the unemployment rate and market sentiment.

Mahesh Vyas of CMIE said the unemployment rate has seen a fall, mostly due to the decrease in the number of people actively looking out for jobs. The unemployment rate comprises of the people unemployed in the labour force, which is the sum of those employed and people seeking jobs actively. 

People who are not seeking jobs actively are not included in the labour force when the unemployment rate is calculated. 

According to the survey analysis, job losses during the early months following demonetisation were so severe that those who lost jobs also lost hopes of finding alternative jobs because there were none around. 

As a result, people who dropped out of the employed labour force, dropped out of the labour force altogether at that time. The labour force is the denominator in the ratio of unemployment rate. It is much larger than the numerator (the unemployed). As a result, when an equal amount is reduced from both the numerator and the denominator, the ratio (which is the unemployment rate) falls.

Experts in the MSME sector and other major employment generating fields, like manufacturing, agreed that economic activity and also job creation has had a lull post-demonetisation due to the cash crunch.

Andhra University Economics Department professor M Prasada Rao said there are different metrics to be taken into consideration to find out the unemployment rate, otherwise the figures do not reflect the ground reality.

 “Poor labour participation due to demonetisation could be one of the reasons, but crop yield also plays an important role. The Kharif foodgrains production has witnessed a record high this year. This means some people could not see the need to seek jobs in this time. The method of unemployment calculation also makes difference,” he concluded. 

Graduates can’t find jobs to suit their qualification
Of the 1,000 unemployed persons, 137 have graduate-level qualifications and 69 per cent are jobless due to non-availability of jobs matching their education, skill and experience, according to the last report of the Labour Bureau of the Union government.

The Labour Bureau, for its annual survey, had conducted the survey in 295 villages and 220 urban blocks in AP.

Moreover, 133 of the 1000 unemployed are post- graduates and 76 per cent of them are unemployed because of the non- availability of jobs and 20 per cent because of inadequate remuneration.