Gender and Social differentials in Employment Situation In India

Assessment of social disparity by various grades of employment provides comparative insight into the impact of affirmative policies in India. Affirmative policies in India have been implemented for almost six decades, which are expected to bring the historically backward groups representation in employment in par with the forward caste group. In this paper, we use the simple arithmetic and geometric ratios and further theil index of disparity to measure between and within group disparities among the social groups in terms of representation in various grades of employment. Further, analysis is done to measure the population inertia in terms of growth of population in employment by social groups using Stable Equivalent Ratio. Results reveal existing disparities between the social groups in terms of participation in employment further increased with the inclusion of population with higher education. Consistently, the gap between the forward caste and backward caste further widened in participation in employment . Analysis by gender also reveals between male and female disparities are significant within social group in employment. Results reveal that backward caste group of India still lag far behind compared to forward caste group in terms of representation at higher grades of employment.