A man has to perform many roles in his life, the most crucial of which is that of an earning member. It is crucial not because a man spends approximately one-third of his lifetime performing this role but because it determines both his livelihood and status. It also enables an individual to support his family and fulfil his social obligations to society. It makes possible for him to achieve power, too. If a person, with a capacity and potential to work, refuses to work or fails to obtain work, he not only does not gain any status in society but also comes to suffer from several emotional and social problems. His plight affects himself, his family, and the society too. No wonder, unemployment has been described as the most significant sociological problem in society. Opportunity for employment then becomes imperative in all such cultures which claim to be democracies. Equal employment opportunity is a prerequisite for equal accessibility to achieved status. Attempts to deal with unemployment have hitherto been two-pronged: one, to alleviate the status of the unemployed, and two, to abolish unemployment itself. After independence, though the governments both central and state-have taken the problem into their hands, they have remained ineffective in tackling this and in providing assis tance to persons unable to support themselves. Unemployment is still viewed an an economic rather than a social phenomenon.
What is unemployment?
If a man with a PhD degree works as a petty clerk in an office, he will not be considered an unemployed person. At most, be would be viewed as an 'underemployed person. An unemployed person is "one who having potentialities and willingness to earn, is unable to find a remunerative work".
Unemployment has three elements:
(i) an individual should be capable of working,
(ii) an individual should be willing to work, and
(iii) an individual must make an effort to find work.
On this basis, a person who is physically and/or mentally disabled, or who is chronically ill and unable to work, or a sadhu who because of his status as an incharge of a math, considers it below dignity to work, or a beggar who does not want to work, cannot be included in the definition of unemployed persons. A society is believed to be in a "condition of full employment" if the period of enforced idleness remains minimum. A society with full employment has four characteristics: (i) an individual takes very little time to find remunerative work according to his capabilities and qualifications, (ii) he is sure of finding remunerative work, (ii) the number of vacant jobs in the society exceeds the number of job seekers, and (iv) work is available on 'adequate remuneration".
Magnitude
Indian labour market is characterized by part-time workers, seasonality of work, underemployment and social factors which restrict many women from joining the labour force. Though it is often repeated that there has been an alarming rise in unemployment in our country since independence, the exact number of unemployed persons is not yet known. In India, the National Sample Survey Organization (NSSO) conducts surveys employment/unemployment scenario in the country. The figures given are based only on estimates. The estimates only take into consideration the on number of persons registered in the employment exchanges and these employment exchanges cover mainly the urban areas. Registration with the employment exchanges being voluntary, not all the unemployed register their names in the exchanges. While the number of unemployed persons in the country registered in the employment exchanges in 1952 was 4.37 lakh, in 1967 it increased w 27.40 lakh, in 1971 to 50,99 lakh, in 1976 to 93.26 lakh (Surya, January 1979: 50-50 in 1981 to 178 lakh, in 1983 to 220 lakh, in 1985 to 263 lakh, in 1987 so 300 lakh, in 1990 to 334 lakh (India Today, May 31,1991: 117), in 1993 to 342 lakh and in 1995 to 381 lakh (The Hindustan Times, March 19, 1997). As per the latest information available, given by the Ministry of Labour & Employment, Government of India, educated and uneducated job seekers, residing in rural and urban areas both, registered with employment exchanges in the country, as on 31st December, 2009, were 381.52 lakh
Types
1) Seasonal unemployment : is inherent in the agricultural sector and certain manufacturing units like sugar and ice factories. The nature of work in a sugar factory or an ice factory is such that the workers have to remain out of work for about six months in a year.
2) Agricultural unemployment : is caused on account of a number of factors First, the landholdings are so small that even the family members of the working age groups are not absorbed by the land. Second, the nature of work is seasonal. Broadly speaking, a cultivator in India remains unemployed for about four to six months in a year.
3) Cyclical unemployment : is caused because of the ups and downs in tra and business. When the entrepreneurs earn high profits, they invest them in business which increases employment, but when they get less profits or suffer from losses or their products remain unsold and pile up
4) Industrial unemployment : is caused because of a large-scale migration of people from rural to urban areas, losses incurred by industries, slow growth of industries, competition with foreign industries, unplanned industrialization, defective industrial policies, labour strikes
5) Technological unemployment : is caused due to the introduction of automation or other technological changes in industry or other work places. It is also caused due to the reduction in man power necessary to produce a finished product.
6) Educational unemployment : is caused because the system of education is largely unrelated to life. In fact, one of the University Grants Commission's (UGC) annual reports stated clearly that the present system of education is generating much waste and stagnation. The (education) system is irrelevant because of the stress it lays on higher education which can be given only to a small minority, most of whom would in any case be unemployed or unemployable once they graduate.
Causes
Economists have explained unemployment in terms of lack of capital, lack of investment and high production. Some believe that unemployment has its roots in the decline in the business cycle following a period of industrial prosperity. A few hold that dislocations in the industries and an inability to forecast the market have put a sizeable proportion of men out of work. Yet others are of the opinion that sudden economic deflation and impersonal forces of economic competition cause loss of work. Improvements in machine technology, over-production, falsely stimulated speculation, social emphasis upon monetary success and the inevitable depressions-all these make for crippling disruption in the demand of labour
Social Factors
Several scholars have now maintained that unemployment cannot be ascribed only to economic factors. Social and personal factors equally contribute to unemployment. In sociological terms, unemployment can be described as the product of a combination of social factors like degrading social status, geographical immobility, rapid growth of population, and defective educa tional system; and personal factors like lack of experience, vocational unfitness, and illness and disability.
Rural Unemployment
Take the question of rural unemployment. For a number of years now, the government has announced a number of employment guarantee programmes, perceiving them as poverty alleviation strategies. There was the Food for Work Programme, renamed the National Rural Employment Programme (NREP). Then came the Rural Landless Employment Guarantee Programme (RLEGP) both of which were subsequently merged into the Jawahar Rozgar Yojana (JRY). To this, the government added the Employment Guarantee Scheme in March 1990, but the scheme never took off despite periodic announcements about adopting the Maharashtra model, said to be functioning well. And, as stated earlier, the UPA government launched its flagship scheme-MNREGS-in 2005 to eradicate both the poverty and unemployment from the rural areas
Unemployment in India