Not in Education, Employment or Training: Incidence, Determinants and Costs in India

An individual is termed as NEET, who is neither employed, nor is (s)he attending any educational institution, nor is (s)he attending any sort of skill developing training. Thus, in a sense, NEET not only includes the currently unemployed population, but also includes the individuals who are more likely than not to be unemployed in the future, since they are not engaged in any productive activity whatsoever. NEET is essentially a measure of complete disengagement from the labor market. This study draws on the NSSO Employment and Unemployment Survey for the years 2004–05 and 2011–12 to firstly find the proportion and the absolute number of NEET in India. Secondly, we consider various socio-economic factors to assess whether they are significant determinants of being NEET using logistic regression models. Finally, we provide an estimate of the total loss in earnings of the individual. For this purpose, we calculate the proportions of NEET from the NSS data, and the total population figures were used using Census 2001 and 2011 data. We found that being a female and being married increase the odds of being a NEET significantly. Apart from this, family affluence, age, education level and socio-religious community of the individual were all found to be significant determinants of NEET. Finally, we found that the total income loss to the NEET was about 2% of GDP in 2004–05 and about 7% in 2011–12.