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India’s Youth NEET Crisis Exposes Limits of Unemployment Data
India’s overall unemployment number has gone down.
But young people still have a much harder time finding jobs.
Young graduates can face especially high unemployment.
Many of the new jobs are in farming or jobs that do not pay much.
More women are working, but many are in low-paying self-employment.
The usual unemployment rate only counts people who say they are looking for work.
Some people, especially women or discouraged workers, may not be counted in that group.
The NEET measure includes young people who are not working, studying, or training, and about one-quarter of Indian youth fall into this category.
India’s overall unemployment rate fell from 6.1% in 2017-18 to 3.1% in 2025, according to official data.
Youth unemployment declined from nearly 18% in 2017-18 to about 10% in 2022-23, but has remained high since then.
Unemployment is especially severe among young graduates, reaching nearly 40% for some 25-year-olds seeking work.
Most recent job growth has occurred in agriculture or low-paying, stagnant-earning work, including women’s self-employment.
About 25% of Indians aged 15-29 were NEET in 2025, implying roughly 92 million young people in 2026.
- Who
- Indian youth aged 15-29, especially graduates and women, are the focus; researchers at Azim Premji University analyzed the data.
- What
- The article examines youth unemployment, job quality, and the NEET population—people not in employment, education, or training.
- Where
- India.
- When
- The figures cover 2017-18 through 2025, with a 2026 estimate based on 2025 NEET levels.
- Why
- The standard unemployment rate may understate job-market stress because it excludes people who are outside the labour force, including discouraged workers and some women affected by social norms.
Official UER Perspective
Broader Labour-Market Critique
What the unemployment rate shows
Official UER Perspective
Official data shows the overall unemployment rate steadily declining, suggesting that employment opportunities have expanded.
Broader Labour-Market Critique
Researchers argue that the rate counts only people in the labour force who are working or actively seeking work, leaving out discouraged workers and others who are not recorded as job seekers.
Meaning of rising employment
Official UER Perspective
The workforce and employment levels have increased, indicating that more people have jobs than in earlier years.
Broader Labour-Market Critique
The quality of those jobs is a concern because much of the growth has been in agriculture, low-paying work, or self-employment with stagnant earnings.
Best measure of youth job stress
Official UER Perspective
A falling unemployment rate provides evidence of improving labour-market conditions.
Broader Labour-Market Critique
The NEET measure is broader because it includes young people who are neither employed nor in education or training; about one-quarter of Indian youth were NEET in 2025.
Key facts
- Overall unemployment rate
- The official unemployment rate for people aged 15 and above fell from 6.1% in 2017-18 to 3.1% in 2025.
- Youth unemployment
- For people aged 15-29, unemployment fell from nearly 18% in 2017-18 to about 10% in 2022-23 and has remained around that level.
- Graduate unemployment
- The unemployment rate for some 25-year-old graduates seeking work was nearly 40%.
- Employment growth
- The employed population rose from 490 million to 572 million between 2021-22 and 2023-24.
- Agricultural jobs
- Of 83 million jobs added between 2021-22 and 2023-24, 40 million were in agriculture.
- Women’s employment
- The number of women in the workforce increased from 94 million in 2017-18 to 186 million in 2023-24, while many worked in low-paying self-employment.
- NEET population
- Official data put the share of youth aged 15-29 who were NEET at 25%; applying that rate to the projected 2026 youth population implies about 92 million people.
Quotes
Rosa Abraham
Associate professor of economics at Azim Premji University and co-author of the State of Working India report.
“Unemployment is only measured when you are willing to work and/or searching for a job. But, especially in the case of women (in India), what would happen is that regardless of their education, and even when they have, say, completed graduation, they may not explicitly record or be recorded (in the surveys) as looking for work.”
indianexpress.com
“So UER is really the lowest estimate of people who are not being mobilised into the workforce. There is an entire pool of people who are out of the labour force who are either discouraged workers, or there are social norms (often for women) that keep them out of work.”
indianexpress.com
Sources
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