Unemployment
India's unemployment rate falls to 6.57%, lowest since March 2021: CMIE
India's unemployment rate witnessed a sharp decline to 6.57 per cent in January, the lowest since March 2021, as the country gradually recovers with easing of restrictions following a decline in Omicron cases, according to CMIE.
While unemployment in urban India stood at 8.16 per cent in January, in rural areas it was the lowest at 5.84 per cent, as per data by independent think-tank Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE), reports Business Standard.
In December, the unemployment rate stood at 7.91 per cent, with urban at 9.30 per cent and rural at 7.28 per cent, it added.
Telangana reported the lowest unemployment rate at 0.7 per cent in January, followed by Gujarat (1.2 per cent), Meghalaya (1.5 per cent) and Odisha (1.8 per cent).
Read: How India plans to spiff up economic growth
However, Haryana had the highest unemployment rate at 23.4 per cent, followed by Rajasthan at 18.9 per cent.
CMIE had estimated the number of unemployed in India as of December 2021 at 53 million, of which a huge proportion were women.
CMIE MD and CEO Mahesh Vyas, in his analysis of the December data, said 35 million people were actively looking for work in December 2021, of which 23 per cent or 8 million were women.
An equally important challenge is to provide employment to the additional 17 million who were also not employed and were willing to work if work was available, although they were not actively looking for employment, Vyas added.
US jobless claims hit 52-year low after seasonal adjustments
The number of Americans applying for unemployment benefits plummeted last week to the lowest level in more than half a century, another sign that the U.S. job market is rebounding rapidly from last year's coronavirus recession.
Jobless claims dropped by 71,000 to 199,000, the lowest since mid-November 1969. But seasonal adjustments around the Thanksgiving holiday contributed significantly to the bigger-than-expected drop. Unadjusted, claims actually ticked up by more than 18,000 to nearly 259,000.
The four-week average of claims, which smooths out weekly ups and downs, also dropped — by 21,000 to just over 252,000, the lowest since mid-March 2020 when the pandemic slammed the economy.
Read:Americans are spending but inflation casts pall over economy
Since topping 900,000 in early January, the applications have fallen steadily toward and now fallen below their prepandemic level of around 220,000 a week. Claims for jobless aid are a proxy for layoffs.
Overall, 2 million Americans were collecting traditional unemployment checks the week that ended Nov. 13, down slightly from the week before.
“Overall, expect continued volatility in the headline figures, but the trend remains very slowly lower," Contingent Macro Advisors wrote in a research note.
Until Sept. 6, the federal government had supplemented state unemployment insurance programs by paying an extra payment of $300 a week and extending benefits to gig workers and to those who were out of work for six months or more. Including the federal programs, the number of Americans receiving some form of jobless aid peaked at more than 33 million in June 2020.
Read:US reopens to international travel, allows happy reunions
The job market has staged a remarkable comeback since the spring of 2020 when the coronavirus pandemic forced businesses to close or cut hours and kept many Americans at home as a health precaution. In March and April last year, employers slashed more than 22 million jobs.
But government relief checks, super-low interest rates and the rollout of vaccines combined to give consumers the confidence and financial wherewithal to start spending again. Employers, scrambling to meet an unexpected surge in demand, have made 18 million new hires since April 2020 and are expected to add another 575,000 this month. Still, the United States remains 4 million short of the jobs it had in February 2020.
Companies now complain that they can't find workers to fill job openings, a near-record 10.4 million in September. Workers, finding themselves with bargaining clout for the first time in decades, are becoming choosier about jobs; a record 4.4 million quit in September, a sign they have confidence in their ability to find something better.
Extreme poverty to fall to 3% by 2030: FM
Foreign Minister Dr AK Abdul Momen on Monday said extreme poverty rate will come down to 3 percent by 2030 and that the country will be free of poverty after 2041.
"Once 80 percent people were poor in Bangladesh but now the poverty rate stands at 20 percent thanks to good initiatives. The Sheikh Hasina government laid emphasis on eliminating poverty from the country in 2009," he said at the unwrapping ceremony of the book titled "Sheikh Hasina Sarker" at Jatiya Press Club in the capital.
Momen said Bangladesh needs the incumbent government for its further development.
Also read: SANEM survey: Population below poverty line doubled, extreme poor trebled in 2020
"Once our annual average growth rate was 2.2 percent. Now it’s 6.9 percent. It's an unbelievable development. Bangabandhu brought freedom and his daughter fulfilled his dreams," he said.
Momen said Bangladesh once faced serious food crisis. The government announced to resolve the problem providing subsidy in agriculture sector. Now there is no food crisis.
"Earlier, power cuts were common [but now] the government has increased power production to 24,000MW from 2009-2020," the minister added.
The Foreign Minister said the government took lots of initiatives to make the population skilled to eliminate unemployment. Besides, the government took steps to tackle climate change impact.
He said that is why the Prime Minister won champion of the earth award and earned the respect of the global audience.
Also read: PM vows to wipe out poverty through united efforts
About Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Dhaka, Momen said we are honoured that he chose Bangladesh to be his first tour abroad since the coronavirus outbreak.
He added that 65 countries sent messages to appreciate Bangladesh. They also appreciated Sheikh Hasina for the Rohingya response.
Momen highlighted Bangladesh’s development and said the country currently has a forex reserve of $44 billion and is regarded as a leader in South Asia.
Also read: COVID-19 could push over 1 bln into extreme poverty: UNDP
The author of the book Razu Alim said he tried to include various information about the government of Sheikh Hasina in his book. Jatiya Press Club President Farida Yesmin and Awami League Office Secretary Biplob Barua were also present at the event.
Household incomes fell by 20pc due to Covid-19: BBS survey
Although the average household income declined by 20 percent due to Covid-19 fallout, the resumption of economic activities helped bring down the unemployment rate, according to a survey of Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BBS).
August jobs likely to point to a still-slow recovery: reports say
Economists have forecast that employers added 1.4 million jobs in August and that the unemployment rate fell from 10.2 percent to 9.8 percent, according to a survey by data provider FactSet.
Bay fishing ban made 70pc fishermen jobless: COAST
About 70 percent fishermen of the coastal belt have lost their jobs because of the ongoing 65-days ban on fishing in the Bay of Bengal, a new study says.
Distribute stimulus packages properly: Speakers
Amid the growing unemployment and poverty rate during the shutdown period due to COVID-19, economists and businesses urged the government to distribute all stimulus packages properly in the affected sectors.
3.3 million seek US jobless aid, nearly 5 times earlier high
Nearly 3.3 million Americans applied for unemployment benefits last week — almost five times the previous record set in 1982 — amid a widespread economic shutdown caused by the coronavirus.
Unemployment rises in Spain in October
The number of people out of work in Spain at the end of October rose by 97,948 to about 3.18 million, according to figures published on Tuesday by the Ministry of Labor, Migrations and Social Security.