COVID-19, lockdown impact: 27 mn youth in their 20s lost their jobs in April, reveals CMIE

COVID-19 and the nationwide lockdown has resulted in job loss for arnuond 27 million youth in the age group of 20-30 years in April 2020. Revealing this, the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE) said in its weekly report that the unemployment rate fell from 27.1 percent to 24 percent. For the week ended 10 May, labour participation rate rose from 36.2 percent to 37.6 percent as the centre as opened industries in a staggered manner and, employment rate from 26.4 percent to 28.6 percent.

Data from CMIE’s Consumer Pyramids Household Survey reveals youngsters in the age group 20-24 years accounted for 8.5 percent of the total employed persons in the country in 2019-20. But, they accounted for 11 percent of those who lost jobs. Around 34.2 million of these young men and women were working in 2019-20. In April 2020 their numbers were down to 20.9 million. Over 13 million youngsters lost their jobs in the lockdown.

Another 14 million jobs were lost in the age-group 25-29 years, the CMIE report said. “This loss again, was disproportionately high. This group accounted for 11.1 percent of total employment in 2019-20 but it accounted for 11.5 percent of the job losses,” the report said.

Over 27 million youngsters in their 20s lost their jobs in April. This has serious long-term repercussion, the report said, adding it is during this age that young India builds its career in the hope of a bright future. If the career of this cohort is disrupted or postponed by even a year it will have to compete with the new cohorts joining the labour force after them - arguably, for fewer jobs. Young India will not be able to build the savings it will require later in life, the report said.

In April, 33 million men and women in their 30s lost jobs. Around 86 percent of the job losses were among men.

The CMIE report said, job losses among the vulnerable are likely to raise the proportion of households in debt. It will also possibly raise debt delinquency. Job losses among the young population would have implications on savings. While households may well conserve cash during these times, the loss of jobs among the young deprives households of the extra cash that is mostly saved for either buying a house or durables or for retirement. This loss of savings will have long-term implications, the report said.