Our employment trends call for deep thought on job-stealing AI
small and medium enterprises. Simultaneously, the share of farmers went up from 23.2% to 27.6%, indicating reverse migration from urban to rural India. This trend also reveals the darker side of our growth story, as it does show that job creation has lagged in urban regions and not kept pace with economic growth.
A high cost of living and lack of affordable accommodation have had clear roles in this reverse flow. Fifth, a sector-wise jobs distribution shows negative growth in agriculture and industry, while it has been positive only for services, at 1.5% per annum. The share of services is almost the same as that of agriculture at 36%.
Within industry, which accounted for 27% of employment in 2022-23, the highest share is in real estate and construction (mainly blue-collar) with 17.5%, while manufacturing is a laggard with 8.8%. The shift to services is sharp, as jobs are getting generated in this area. Stagnant and low growth in manufacturing has led to a compounded annual shrinkage of 2% in this sector.
Sixth, within services, trade dominated with 17% of the 36% overall share, and retail accounting for the bulk of it. These would be local kirana shops that are spread far and wide. Financial and personal services were among the segments that saw growth.
Finally, though not easy to interpret, CMIE data on employment across religions throws up interesting observations. The share of Hindus and Muslims came down. They account for almost 96% of the total; the share of Christians, Buddhists and Jains rose, while that of Sikhs was unchanged.
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