Fewer women in Delhi part of workforce: Here’s what a comparison with national data shows

WPR is an indicator used to assess the country’s employment situation. The ratio informs us about the proportion of a country’s population that actively contributes to the production of goods and services. LFPR refers to all people of working age who are employed or are seeking work, excluding individuals who are neither working nor looking for work like students, pensioners and housewives.

As compared to women, 54.5% of men were part of the workforce in 2021-22, higher than 51.9% in 2017-18, when the data was last collected. The participation of women in the workforce registered a drop to 8.8% as compared to 9.9% five years ago.

On what could explain the trend, Pamela Philipose, who has worked extensively on gender issues, said: “The trend is there at a larger level, if we see. So, it is not surprising that the employment rate of women is falling in Delhi also. But, there could be a few factors behind this — one is the conservative reason that several well-off women have the option of sitting at home, and the second one, which is a major reason, is that there are no jobs available, especially for women, where they would like to be employed.”

She added, “There are no jobs that women would like to work for and there are also push-out factors. If there is a job with both male and female candidates, the former will be selected. There is a gender gap there. Furthermore, the pandemic could also be one of the reasons.”

Unemployment rate higher than national level

Further, the unemployment rate in the capital in 2021-22 was also higher than the national level, reveals data. The unemployment rate defines persons who want to work but are not doing so despite being available for employment and actively seeking work. This reflects the inability of an economy to generate suitable employment.

According to the report, the unemployment rate of the city’s male population was 5.1%, and the female population was 6% in 2021-22. The corresponding figures for India during this period were 4.4% and 3.3% respectively.

On the other hand, the participation of men in the workforce has increased, going from 50.8% to 54.5%. As compared to all India levels, it is slightly lower by 0.03%.

“The number of working women is far less in comparison to men. This could be due to various socio-economic factors,” said a Delhi government official.

More women opt for salaried jobs

Even though the overall data of women’s participation in the working sector has seen a dip, compared to men, women seemed more keen on regular, salaried jobs.

The broader employment status in Delhi shows that of the total female workers, 83.0% were in the regular wage/salaried employee category, 17.0% in the self-employed category, and none in the casual labour sector in 2021-22. In the same year, 33.1 % of male workers were in the self-employed category, 63.3% in the regular wage/salaried employee category, and 3.5% in the casual labour category.

On the positive side, in Delhi, women seem to be excelling in the education sector and the literacy rate has also increased in the last 10 years. During the same period, the gender gap decreased in Rural and Urban Areas, from 12.0% to 7.7% and from 9.2% to 8.7% respectively.