Oxfam India’s ‘India Discrimination Report, 2022’
Recently Oxfam India has released ‘India Discrimination Report 2022’.
The report underlines the fact that women in India will be discriminated against in the labor market despite having the same educational qualifications and work experience as men.
The main reason for this discrimination is the prejudice of the society and the employers.
The report’s findings are based on government data on employment and labor from 2004-05 to 2019-20.
Key findings of report-
- Gender discrimination is responsible for 98% of the employment gap that exists between men and women.
- Discrimination is also the reason for the 93% difference in the income of men and women.
- Discrimination (67%) and lack of education and work experience (33%) are responsible for low wages for salaried women.
- Self-employed SC/ST people earn Rs. 5,000 less than non-SC/ST people. Discrimination is responsible for 41% of this difference.
- Women casual workers earn around Rs. 3,000 less than their male counterparts.
Key recommendations-
- There is a need to encourage the participation of women in the workforce. These include wage increases, skill improvement, job reservations and providing easy options to return to work after becoming a mother.
- Measures need to be taken to ensure equal pay and security of work for all women.
- Measures should be taken to ensure more equitable distribution of domestic work and child care duties between men and women.
- In particular, a “living wage” should be introduced instead of a minimum wage for all informal workers.
- As far as possible contractual, temporary and casual work should be converted into formal work.
Subsistence Wage: It is the wage, which enables workers and their families to meet their basic needs.
Minimum Wage: The minimum amount of remuneration that is paid by an employer to a salaried person for work done during a given period. This salary/remuneration cannot be reduced by collective agreement or individual contract.
Source- The Hindu
