No matter how old you are, what your occupation is, what your educational qualifications are or where you live, chances are that you are worried about somebody's job-your own, your wife's, your child's, your friend's ... From college campuses to company boardrooms to assembly lines in factories, the fear of losing a job, or not finding one, has gripped the majority of 313 million working Indians.

Economy

OTHER STORIES RELATED TO ECONOMY Full BITE Discussion

The figures on the facing page partly explain that fear. Three of the four major sectors of the economy-agriculture, manufacturing and mining-haven't added to their workforce since the late 1990s. Employment in these sectors actually shrunk by over three lakh between 1996 and 2000. In the 22 months since then, the data for which isn't available, the mayhem has only intensified.

To be clear, these figures relate only to the organised sector, where most urban and vocal middle-class people work. But it accounts for just 10 per cent of total employment in the country. Over 90 per cent of working Indians are employed in what is called the unorganised sector comprising mainly jobs in rural and small-scale industries where employment squeeze isn't as severe. So, is the fear about joblessness an exaggerated concern of less than 10 per cent vocal Indians? Not really. In fact, the state of the job market is much worse than what the job loss numbers suggest.

Employment in manufacturing sector rose and fell the fastest	Agriculture employment peaked in 1992
Mining, the smallest employer, is shrinking since 1994	Services defy trend by being the only net creator of jobs
THE BALANCE-SHEET 2,33,000 lost in manufacturing 95,000 shed in mining 41,000 gone in agriculture 69,000 added in services Manufacturing and services data between 1998 and 2000; others between 1996 and 2000. « Job losses are combined with rising job insecurity « Because new jobs are not as permanent as old jobs were « That's turning job insecurity into economic insecurity « Insecurity is rising despite consistent rise in wage levels « Productivity levels too have risen fastest in the 1990s « Jobs are not being created in places where they are being lost.

Job insecurity-the fear of losing one's job-has intensified across all sections, organised and unorganised. Combined with employment insecurity-the fear of not finding a job-it has fuelled economic insecurity among all income classes. The growing fear is that existing jobs are under threat and new jobs are difficult to come by. Besides, organised sector jobs are some of India's best paid and most productive jobs. The organised sector generates over 40 per cent of the national income. The squeeze in the organised sector is thus a symptom of a bigger rot in the economy.

How bad is the job market? Is India heading toward jobless growth? Is there a way out of the growing job and economic insecurity? Finding answers to these questions isn't easy even at the best of times. That is why India Today decided to devote the first meeting of the Board of India Today Economists (BITE) to unemployment.

BITE members, chosen from diverse expertise and ideologies, include Suresh Tendulkar, professor, Delhi School of Economics; Kirit Parikh, professor, Indira Gandhi Institute for Development Research and member of the prime minister's Economic Advisory Council; Indira Rajaraman, professor, Institute of Economic Growth; Bibek Debroy, director, Rajiv Gandhi Institute of Contemporary Studies; Subir Gokarn, chief economist, CRISIL; and Siddhartha Roy, chief economist with Hindustan Lever. Jairam Ramesh, former India Today columnist and adviser to past prime ministers and finance ministers, is the moderator for the board discussions.

THE BITE PRESCRIPTION
SURESH TENDULKAR Professor, Delhi School of Economics « Start unemployment insurance scheme with funds from employers, workers and state. « Ease restrictions on layoff since they are hurting both workers and employers « Convince people of the futility of expecting a lifetime job.	KIRIT PARIKH Prof, Indira Gandhi Instt. for Development Research « Remove small-scale reservation for faster manufacturing growth. « Higher public investment in health and education to create more jobs. « Services sector will eventually find acceptance as replacement for old jobs.
BIBEK DEBROY Director, Rajiv Gandhi Instt. of Contemporary Studies « Rigid labour laws veering businesses away from labour-intensive production. « Regional imbalances in economic growth are intensifying job insecurity. « Reviving growth should be top priority for creating new jobs.	INDIRA RAJARAMAN Professor, Institute of Economic Growth « The key issue is to provide employment security in return for job security. « Pre-announced trade reforms are critical for growth and employment. « Limited labour mobility compounds employment insecurity.
SIDDHARTH ROY Chief Economist, Hindustan Lever Ltd Give incentives for shifting to labour-intensive crops like vegetables. Cut excise duty on key products to spur growth and employment. Train people for the new kinds of jobs which are emerging in the services sector.	SUBIR GOKARN Chief Economist, Crisil Align education system with the skills required by jobs in the services sector. Remove legal constraints on land use for services sector. The revival of manufacturing critical for creation of large scale employment.

In its first meeting held on October 11, BITE brainstormed for two-and-a-half hours on the current job market. Minister of Finance and Company Affairs Jaswant Singh, who inaugurated the meeting, unveiled a brief overview and agenda for the economy (see guest column). More than anything else the debate threw up some insightful analyses and ideas on reviving the job market:

Job Insecurity Will Rise

The reasons for the organised sector shedding are clearly rooted in the double whammy that the Indian economy has suffered in the late 1990s: the feeble growth in manufacturing for four years since 1997-98 and extreme volatility in the rural economy. Add to that the virtual halt on hiring in all government departments and government-owned companies and the reasons for the job crunch become apparent.

Remember when you last heard of vacancies for probationary officers (POs) in public-sector banks. Banks stopped hiring POs over 10 years ago. It has been at least five years since a large-scale manufacturing project has been set up in India. Partly due to the existing excess capacities and mostly due to restrictive closure laws, manufacturing is dying a slow death. With that is dying its capacity to create jobs. Agriculture itself is marred by regressive government controls and excessive stocks because of which new investments and employment are at a standstill. Economists believe that legislative changes, revival of sentiments and change in cropping pattern could revive jobs in industry and agriculture. But what Indians will never get back is the job security of the past.

"The days of one lifetime employment are gone," says Tendulkar. Adds Debroy: "The common man will have to understand the difference between job security and employment security." Here's why. The downsizing of government departments and government-run companies will-and should-continue. With that will fade jobs that guaranteed a lifetime of employment. In the private sector, performance and not permanence has become the norm for employment. As a result, more and more private-sector jobs are becoming contractual. Such jobs are inherently unstable, even though they invariably come with higher salaries than a "regular" job.

The economists were unanimous that the job security of the past will have to be sacrificed on the course to high economic growth, higher levels of income and higher living standards. A business that pays high salaries when it prospers must have the right to cut salaries or retire its workers when it perishes. So the legitimate goal should not be job security but employment security. That can come only in a fast growing economy where jobs are so many that getting fired from one place is neutralised by getting hired elsewhere-even if not on the same salary. As long as there is employment security, people will have economic security even in times of job insecurity. This is the economic model that the US has followed for decades and is now been practised in China.

Limited Mobility

Employment security not only depends on the health of the economy but also on the mobility of workers and location of jobs. Explains Rajaraman: "The idea of economic security substituting for job security emanated in the US where people can move seamlessly from one coast to another (in search of jobs) with minimum disruption to their lives. Such mobility is not always possible in India." Certainly not for average middle-class families settled in cities. Sure, the Indian labour is very mobile at the lowest levels of occupation (farm workers, mechanics, housekeeping) and at the highest levels (those migrating to US on H1B visas knowing that America offers no job security). But it is the middle level working class that finds it difficult to move across the country in search of a job. The reasons for restrictive mobility are not psychological, but practical-the hassles of selling one's house and difficulties in changing schools are more acute in India than in the West.

To complicate matters, there is a clear divide in the country between regions losing jobs and those creating jobs. Barring some exceptions, richer regions are getting all the new jobs and poorer regions are losing all the old jobs. As Ramesh puts it sweepingly but concisely, "Eighty per cent of all the jobs being lost on account of industrial closures are east of Kanpur, and 80 per cent of new jobs being created due to new investments are west of Kanpur." So a job loss in cities with failing local economies (like Kolkata, Kanpur and Ranchi) could be far more catastrophic than a job loss in thriving local economies (like Bangalore, Delhi and Hyderabad). Improved labour mobility and balanced regional development will enhance the employment security in times of job insecurity.