Periodic Labour Force Survey (PLFS) Quarterly Bulletin: January-March 2022

The ‘labour force’ is the share of the population “which supplies or offers to supply labour for pursuing economic activities” and thus includes both employed and unemployed people. The labour force participation rate (LFPR) measures the percentage of population within the labour force. The country-wide LFPR – as per the current weekly status – was 37.2 per cent in the January-March 2022 quarter. The LFPR among men was 57.4 per cent and 16.2 per cent among women.

In the same quarter, Bihar recorded the lowest LFPR among women at 6.2 per cent whereas Himachal Pradesh recorded the highest at 24.4 per cent.

The worker population ratio (WPR) is defined as the “percentage of workers in the population”. The overall WPR in India (according to the current weekly status) was 34.2 per cent in the first quarter of 2022. The percentage was much higher among men (53 per cent) than among women (14.5 per cent).

The PLFS outlines the percentage of workers across three categories: self-employed, regular wage/salaried employee and casual labour. During January-March 2022, 39.3 per cent of the workers were self-employed, 48.3 per cent were salaried or earning regular wage and 12.4 per cent were engaged in ‘casual labour’ – defined as labour which is of “casual or seasonal or intermittent nature.”

Among men aged 15 years and above, 40.4 per cent were self-employed, 46.1 per cent were salaried or earned regular wages and 13.6 per cent were engaged in casual labour. In the selected quarter, 35.3 per cent women workers were self-employed, 56.7 per cent earned a regular wage or salary and 8.1 per cent were casual labourers.

The survey outlines the distribution of workers across agricultural, secondary (mining and quarrying, among others) and tertiary sectors in urban areas. During January-March 2022, 5.7 per cent of workers surveyed (aged 15 years and above) were employed in the agricultural sector. Around 34 per cent were engaged in the secondary sector and 60.3 per cent in the tertiary sector.

About 5.1 per cent of the men surveyed were employed in the agricultural sector, 36 per cent in the secondary sector and 58.9 per cent in the tertiary sector. Similarly, among women, eight per cent were employed in the agricultural sector, 26.4 per cent in the secondary sector and 65.6 per cent in the tertiary sector.

Following the current weekly status approach, a person is considered unemployed if they have not worked even for an hour during the reference week but looked for work or were available for employment. The unemployment rate (UR) is the “percentage of unemployed persons in the labour force.” Across all ages, 8.2 per cent people were unemployed during the first quarter of 2022. The UR among women – at 10.1 per cent – was higher than that among men which was noted to be 7.8 per cent.

The UR was considerably higher among people in the age-group 15-29 years – noted to be 20.2 per cent. Within the women labour force in this age-group, the UR was recorded at 25.3 per cent.

Of the states and union territories for which the survey provides data, Jammu and Kashmir recorded the highest overall unemployment rate at 15.6 per cent. Gujarat, on the other hand, recorded the lowest at 4.4 per cent.

Focus and Factoids by Devanshi Parekh.