Employability of women outside the labour force

Employment generation through skill development is among the priorities of Budget 2025-26
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AROYBARMAN

In a population, there are individuals who belong to the labour force — either employed or seeking work — and those outside the labour force — neither employed nor seeking work. According to the latest Periodic Labour Force Survey (PLFS 2023-24) data, 40 per cent of India’s population aged 15+, comprising about 415 million people, is outside the labour force. This of course includes people who are still studying (about 118 million).

Employment generation through skill development is among the priorities of Budget 2025-26. It is expected that through skilling — either formal training or education/vocational qualifications — people can gain employment and contribute to India’s ambitious economic growth targets. While this supports employability from the supply side, adequate and accessible employment opportunities are also required to enable employability from the demand side.

Since the last four survey rounds, PLFS has been reporting the ‘main reason’ for individuals to be outside the labour force (OLF). The options reflecting employability aspects (from supply and demand sides) include: did not have the required training/qualification/age for work; want to continue study; and non-availability of work at a convenient location. How many people are OLF due to these factors? Are there differences by gender and age?

Females comprise a larger share of those OLF. There are nearly twice as many females over males in the 15-29 age group, jumping to nearly 19 times in the 30-59 age group.

Lack of skills, training

Not having the required training/qualification/age for work indicates an inability to meet the available job-role criteria due to potential skill or age-related gaps. Among the youth, females stating this as the reason for being OLF is nearly twice as that of males. The issue aggravates among women in the older cohort of 30-59 years, where females stating this is nearly 32 times that of males. In all, around 1.4 million women of working age are OLF because of this reason, in comparison to about 4,16,000 men.

While ‘not having the required training/qualification/age for work’ may not be the topmost reason for either males or females to be OLF, but the sheer magnitude of the problem indicates that it cannot be ignored either.

Regarding acquisition of skills through their ‘want to continue study’ — this factor is relatively prominent among young males for being OLF, and relatively prominent among females in the older cohort. In all, around 55 million women and 63 million men, of working age, are OLF because of this reason.

Non-availability of work at a convenient location indicates a spatial mismatch — jobs may not be available where there are people available to work. This issue is highly pronounced for females — stated by nearly 12 times more females over males in the 15-29-year age group, and 19 times more females in the 30-59-year age group. In all, around 1.7 million women of working age are OLF because of this reason, in comparison to about 1,19,000 men.

Overcoming the barriers

Available data indicate that many individuals, particularly females, can be brought to participate in the labour force by overcoming their barriers to current and future employability. This will help inch closer to the Budget 2025-26 target of 70 per cent women in India’s workforce.

When a large share of the population ‘wants to continue study’, the aim should be to help this investment be remunerative through gainful future employment. We want to avoid a situation where individuals are not in the labour force because they ‘did not have the required training/qualification for work’. It is therefore important that industry-aligned skilling programmes, with dedicated counselling and mentorship, are promoted — including reskilling and upskilling programmes for older females in the 30-59 age group.

Once individuals have the requisite skills, convenience of commute to the place of work is an equally important criterion to facilitate employment. Females are particularly worse-off in this regard, given that many choose not to work because of ‘non-availability of work at a convenient location’ — indicating the relative difficulty females face, over males, in migrating or travelling long distances for work. This finding holds for females in both urban and rural areas. Working women hostels, accessible and reliable transportation facilities, institutional support for safety and security, as well as job opportunities in rural pockets are all necessary. However, harnessing the power of digital technologies to offer flexible/remote work opportunities can help overcome issues around difficulty of commute altogether.

A positive externality of the above measures is for the large section of women who are outside the labour force due to care commitments in home-making (about 58 million women in the 15-29-year age group and 99 million women in the 30-59-year age group). Re/up-skilling opportunities along with remote work options could present them with a pathway into the labour force, and balance between home and work commitments. Other infrastructure, like care facilities, can go a long way in improving labour force participation.

Dayal is Fellow and Bhandari is Professor at National Council of Applied Economic Research (NCAER). Views are personal

Published on May 27, 2025

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