Fewer jobs for better educated: India’s unemployment rate stands at 13.2% among the highly educated segment

• As education level rises, the rate of unemployment also increases, shows data by Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE).
  
• Unemployment rate among the highly educated stood at 13.2% during September-December 2018.
  
• People with bachelor’s degrees and above account for only 10% of India’s total working age population.
• Rate of unemployment among women — with bachelor’s and master’s degrees — has been higher than men, at 35%.
  

Unemployment has emerged as a key challenge for the Indian government as it heads into the general elections.

A recent analysis by the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE) has shown that the rate of unemployment among qualified youth — those with bachelor degrees and higher — has seen a sharp increase from mid 2017.

The report has highlighted that the unemployment rate for the given group was projected at 13.2% during September - December period in 2018. While in 2017, the number stood at 12.1% for the qualified Indians. The highly educated set of individuals — those with bachelor’s degrees and above — faced the maximum unemployment while the students who passed high school stood at 10.6%, in terms of unemployment numbers.

The CMIE’s Consumer Pyramids Household Survey bifurcated the unemployment numbers according to the levels of education. People who have completed a bachelor’s degree or any other higher level of education account for only 10% of the working age population of India. While over 100 million had a bachelor’s degree or higher as of 2018. Out of these, nearly 53 million of those were employed. While eight million were looking for jobs.

Post graduates (master’s or higher) in India have been facing the biggest challenge to fetch jobs. The unemployment rate among those with a master’s degree is twice the unemployment among the entire labour force, according to the report.

India has a labour participation rate of 61% — for the graduation and above group, which was below 60% mark, a year ago. Labour participation rate is the number of employed people or the ones seeking employment.

Unemployment among women

While the overall labour participation rate — employed and seeking jobs — in the country has improved from the past few years, the female participation was still significantly low at 11.1% during September-December 2018. However, for the females with higher educational qualifications, the numbers hit 22.6%, which is more than twice compared to the average female participation. Unemployment rate among women in this segment stood at 35% during the same period. In contrast, the rate of unemployment for men stood at 10%.

See also:
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