Unemployment rate falls to 5.2% in July and September, share of wage jobs rises in urban areas Business News

Wage work is better than casual work and self-employment because of the Social Security benefits as well as the regular source of income it provides.

For males, the urban wage employment rate rose by 50 basis points to 48 percent in the July-September period, while for females it increased by 40 basis points to 55.5 percent. Overall, paid jobs accounted for 49.8 percent of urban employment in July-September, up from 49.4 percent in April-June.

In rural areas, although the share of paid jobs is lower, it represents a much smaller proportion of employment. In the July-September period, wage jobs accounted for 15 percent of rural employment, down from 15.4 percent in the April-June period, data from the Ministry of Insurance and Social Security showed.

Jobs data is based on the Current Weekly Status (CWS) approach. Under this approach, a person’s activity status is measured during the seven days preceding the survey date. The July-September PLFS report is the second report ever issued by MoSPI under the revamped PLFS methodology. Previous quarterly reports were for urban areas only.

Farm to the fore

While wage employment predominates in urban areas, agriculture is the largest employer in rural areas. From July to September, the share of agricultural jobs rose further.

“The increase in the share of rural employment in the agriculture sector from 53.5 percent to 57.7 percent during the period from July to September 2025 can be attributed to kharif agricultural operations,” the Ministry of Statistics said in a statement.

The increase was larger for males, with the share of agricultural jobs rising by about 5 percentage points to 49.2 percent. However, females in rural areas saw agriculture provide 74.2 percent of all jobs from July to September. From April to June, the percentage was 71 percent.

Women and youth in the workforce

The unemployment rate at the all-India level was 5.2 per cent for both males and females in the period from July to September. However, in urban areas, the unemployment rate saw a rise of 10 basis points to 6.9 percent – males saw the unemployment rate rise to 6.2 percent from 6.1 percent, while females saw a similar rise to 9 percent from 8.9 percent.

The marginal rise in urban unemployment occurred amid a slight increase in the labor force participation rate, which measures the proportion of the population seeking work.

From July to September, the urban unemployment rate for those aged 15 and above rose 10 basis points to 50.7 percent. The female LFPR rate rose 20 basis points to 25.8 percent, which is nearly a third of the male LFPR rate of 75.3 percent.

Among young people, the unemployment rate rose to 14.8 percent in the July-September period from 14.6 percent in the April-June period. Youth unemployment refers to the age group 15-29 years.

The rise in youth unemployment was particularly notable in urban areas, where young men saw the unemployment rate rise by 40 basis points to 16.2 percent, while young women saw it rise by 60 basis points to 25.3 percent. Overall, urban youth unemployment rose to 18.4 percent from 17.9 percent, even as the youth unemployment rate broadly held steady at 41.4 percent.