Page 5 - Consumer Sentiment Indicator

Recovery faces demand constraints

While the supply-side has sprung back at least in the large organised sectors, the demand side continues to remain broken. The demand constraints will pose a challenge to the recovery process

Job losses mount in April

The employment rate fell from 37.6 per cent in March to 36.8 per cent in April

Pessimism on the rise: Consumer sentiment weakens in April amid Covid surge

Consumer sentiments have been battered particularly badly during the last three weeks

Adrift in April

Low employment rates and low labour participation rates leave enough people free to participate in endless political rallies and mammoth religious congregations

Households wary of discretionary spending

The RBI Current Situation Index has been negative in all surveys conducted in the past four years except the one in March 2019

Savings and sentiments in the recovery process

The March 2021 RBI Bulletin states that household financial savings in India shot up to 21% of GDP in the first quarter of 2020-21

Avoid a fresh lockdown

The livelihoods cost of a lockdown is too high. Average household incomes fell by 9.2% in March 2020 and by 27.9% in April 2020 as a result of the lockdown. The impact of that brutal lingers

Consumer durables companies' price gamble

The festive season is over and demand for most consumer durables has weakened. Companies are therefore testing a difficult market as they seek to protect their margins

Women: Educated but unemployed

Indian women work a lot. But, their work is predominantly at home, in service of other members of their household

Consumer sentiments lag household income

Consumer sentiments are important because they reflect the intangible component of households' economic decisions

Year begins well as January recovers employment loss of past three months

Employment in India is still lower than it was before the lockdown, but there are lesser unemployed people willing to work as well. The recovery is still incomplete but, we made good progress in Jan

Not a Budget for employment

Compared to a year ago, employment in January 2020 was lower by 9.8 million

In India's K-shaped economic recovery, keep a watch on middle-income groups

India's better-than-expected recovery story was scripted by households, and not government spending or private sector investments

Labour turns to agri, construction as manufacturing fails to create jobs

Manufacturing accounted for 40 million jobs in 2019-20. In the first quarter this dropped to 24.6 million, implying a loss of over 15 million manufacturing jobs

Recovery on thin ice as India finds itself in a crater on employment front

Economic recovery either stopped in the third quarter or it stopped showing up in recovery in employment

Labour markets disappoint in Dec

The count of the unemployed mounted to 38.7 million in December 2020 compared to 27.4 million in November, registering a massive increase of 11.3 million

Why companies cut wages despite soaring profits amid Covid-19 pandemic

Wages account for a relatively small proportion of the total expenses of corporates in India

Reading the tea leaves: What do jobs data tell us about economic recovery?

Weekly estimates for the first three weeks of December indicate a likely marginal improvement in aggregate employment compared to November

Female workforce shrinks in economic shocks

Given that men continue to be considered as the principal earning member of a household, women are unlikely to accept poor quality jobs

Five million potential workers may have left the labour force entirely

It appears that the recovery phase of employment is over and a decline is setting in again