Unemployment and Data Matrix in India

Unemployment and Data Matrix in India

India’s unemployment rate currently sits at 9%. Yet, one in three citizens with at least a bachelor’s degree is out of work. Its working age population is projected to rise from over 750 million today to almost a billion by 2020. At the same time, agricultural employment is in decline, accounting for less than 50% of total employment for the first time in India history. In my life span of 36 years, I have seen a mass movement from rural to urban areas to get job and to live a decent life style. All this population is nothing but the farmers (or their children) who left agricultural job and migrated to urban areas.

Our Indian government has no precise data as such which can direct the policy makers to create some feasible plan / policies to address the unemployment issue in the country. The government has no precise data which can give a glance of rural / urban population unemployment rate along with age group and gender. I have seen the great Indian politicians giving baseless statements on unemployment and daily wages of the labors during the election rallies. The rise and rise of child labors in India is because of these factors.

Fifteen years ago in Germany, a push from researchers and the strong will of the administration led to the creation of a unique database on individual workers. After that, German government made effective policies and rules to fight with the unemployment issue and they did it well.

India does not have to start from scratch in creating a similar data set. In fact, most of the raw data needed are already collected. Many industries have to report employee wages to comply with Employee Provident Fund. Individuals are required to report income in their tax returns. Almost all benefit programs in India collect and maintain their own data. The only thing remaining is to link and clean the data originating from different sources.

This kind of data will definitely help to create feasible labor laws in the country. Better data leads to more efficient investment by the government as well as outside agencies. Most importantly, the costliest part of this endeavor, collecting the raw data, is already being done. Creating, maintaining and allowing access to administrative data will encourage high quality research on the Indian Labor market. The benefits to policy makers and the Indian public are clear. I hope the current government in India (Modi Government) will take care of this and help Indians to live a decent and prosperous life.

- Sanat

Entrepreneurship in Silicon Valley, California

This is quite an interesting topic that I am going to word down here. After spending some time in California, I am seeing lots of Indians in Computer industry. From an age group of 20+ to an age group of 45. But there are few companies having Indian CEOs (or companies started by India). When explored the same, got some interesting information and facts.

30 years ago, there were hardly any Silicon Valley firms with Indian-born founders. A survey says that 7 percent of tech companies started in 1980 to 1998 had an India founder. This proportion had increased to 13.4 percent from 1995 to 2005 and then to 15.5. percent in 2012.

Indian immigrants didn't have it easy. Actually, they were great at mathematics and made great engineers but didn't make great CEOs. There might be the reason that they didn't have the necessary management skills and could't fit into the rough and tough American business management culture. The VCs have a opinion about Indian entrepreneurs saying that Indians didn't fit the pattern that they knew would lead to success.

When first generation of Indians in Silicon Valley succeeded in shattering the glass ceiling, they decided to help other follow their path. In 1992, a number of highly successful Indian business executives formed a group called "The Indus Entrepreneurs" which is now called TiE (http://sv.tie.org). Their mission was to given back to the community by fostering entrepreneurship. They would hold monthly events, teach entrepreneurship, and provide mentoring and support. 

I worked in US with one of a very senior person (Indian origin) who started his own organization in early 2000 but failed to accelerate the same. Now he is working as a senior Manager with one of the biggest IT names in California.

- Sanat Sharma