IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eme/ijsepp/v43y2016i5p502-516.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Labour force participation of elderly in India: patterns and determinants

Author

Listed:
  • A Bheemeshwar Reddy

Abstract

Purpose - – The purpose of this paper is to analyse the labour force participation of older persons (aged 60 and above) in India from 1983 to 2011-2012. The paper also briefly reviews the conditions of work for the elderly and examines different socio-economic and demographic factors that are associated with labour force participation of elderly in India. Design/methodology/approach - – The author uses data from repeated cross-sectional rounds of Employment and Unemployment Surveys of National Sample Survey Office from 1983 to 2011-2012. The author uses probit regression model to identify the socio-economic and demographic variables that are associated with the labour participation of the elderly in India. Findings - – The results show that labour force participation rate of older persons in rural India remained almost stable between 1983 and 2011-2012, despite the rapid economic growth that India experienced during the same period. Further, the results show that among the elderly, those who belong to relatively poor socio-economic status are more likely to participate in the labour force. It is observed that large percentage of the elderly workforce are engaged in poorly paid jobs in the informal sector, either as casual workers or as self-employed in low-skilled or unskilled occupations. Research limitations/implications - – This paper is mostly descriptive in its analysis and it only points to the possible socio-economic and demographic determinants of elderly labour force participation in India. Originality/value - – Given that the studies on employment of elderly in India are scanty, this paper provides new evidence on changes in labour force participation of elderly over last three decades. Further, this study makes an attempts to understand who among the elderly most likely to participation in labour force in India.

Suggested Citation

  • A Bheemeshwar Reddy, 2016. "Labour force participation of elderly in India: patterns and determinants," International Journal of Social Economics, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 43(5), pages 502-516, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:eme:ijsepp:v:43:y:2016:i:5:p:502-516
    DOI: 10.1108/IJSE-11-2014-0221
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.1108/IJSE-11-2014-0221/full/html?utm_source=repec&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=repec
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers
    File URL: https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.1108/IJSE-11-2014-0221/full/pdf?utm_source=repec&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=repec
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1108/IJSE-11-2014-0221?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Cintya Lanchimba & Joselyn Quisnancela & Yasmín Salazar Méndez, 2020. "The choice of elderly labor: Evidence from Ecuador," Revista de Analisis Economico – Economic Analysis Review, Universidad Alberto Hurtado/School of Economics and Business, vol. 35(1), pages 75-97, April.
    2. Jeong, Su Yeon & Kim, Jinyoung, 2020. "Asset or burden? Impact of children on parents’ retirement," Journal of Asian Economics, Elsevier, vol. 71(C).
    3. Visaria, Abhijit & Dommaraju, Premchand, 2019. "Productive aging in India," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 229(C), pages 14-21.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eme:ijsepp:v:43:y:2016:i:5:p:502-516. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Emerald Support (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.