wl-4798-Visualising the Invisible: Re-examining Women’s Labour Force Participation in India

The categorisation used by India’s labour force surveys have failed to capture three evolving dynamics of labour market. Firstly, the gender difference in amount of work provided toward economic activities and contribution to GDP is overstated at present because the PLFS poorly records goods production within households when unpaid workers do non-monetized work. Secondly, the decision-making sharing within small firms has been underemphasized, too. The PLFS could benefit from separating non-decision makers (who are contributing family workers) explicitly from entrepreneurs. Thirdly, the gig economy and cottage industries have not been kept distinct from casual hourly labour, hence are confused with piecework in India. Taking these changes into account, we estimate that 6 percent of women currently considered inactive would become part of the labour force. Hence, we argue that methodological changes will be a small step in capturing the contribution of women in the economic activities. (146 words)