India’s growth story needs jobs to match the numbers, says ex-RBI Governor D Subbarao
Former RBI Governor D Subbarao has said India must make economic growth more employment-intensive, warning that rapid output expansion alone cannot deliver a demographic dividend. He called for greater private investment, labour-intensive manufacturing and improved skills, while urging transparent technical scrutiny of GDP estimates and differences with other economic indicators.
Former Reserve Bank of India Governor D Subbarao cautioned that India's impressive economic growth figures could become a liability if they don't translate into productive employment opportunities for the nation's workforce. To sustain growth of 7% or more, Subbarao highlighted the need for stronger private investment, labor-intensive manufacturing, enhanced human capital development, and deeper integration into global value chains.
He emphasized that the nature of growth, alongside the pace of expansion, plays a crucial role in employment generation and overall economic resilience.
Subbarao pointed out that India's recent 7.8% growth in the first quarter underscores its resilience, but he cautioned against complacency. The World Bank recently raised India's GDP growth forecast for the current fiscal year to 7.1%, citing robust domestic demand and strong exports despite global challenges. The Asian Development Bank, OECD, and rating agencies S&P and Fitch have also increased their growth projections for India to around 7% for FY27.
While Subbarao acknowledged strong performance driven by resilient domestic consumption, public infrastructure investment, and healthy activity in manufacturing and services, he stressed that sustained high growth depends on generating enough employment to support broader income growth and consumption. He identified underemployment among agricultural workers, informal and poorly paid jobs in the services sector, and the difficulty educated young people face in finding suitable work as significant concerns.
The former RBI chief argued that weak income growth among large segments of the population can constrain consumption, discourage business investment and expansion, and ultimately hinder economic growth. Subbarao urged the need to promote labor-intensive manufacturing, including textiles, garments, footwear, and food processing, while expanding productive services employment, improving vocational training, and facilitating small businesses' growth into larger, more productive enterprises.
He stressed that India's economic priorities should focus on creating jobs that raise productivity, not just output growth. Without this, the demographic dividend could turn into a demographic disappointment.
Written by urgent.news from The Economic Times - Economy's reporting — not their text. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
