Data Bytes

Fewer women than men being in the labour force is a global phenomenon, but the gender gap is one of the highest in India. While 80% of men are part of the labour force, only 40% of women are in the labour force in the country.

Both men and women may enter, leave, and re-enter the labour force for a range of reasons. However, the circumstances that take men and women out of the labour force are very different.

India's national labour surveys ask people who are currently not working but have worked in the past the reason for dropping out of work. Most men between the ages of 20-49 years cite health as the reason, followed by lay-offs or contract termination.

Health reasons take some women out of work as well, but the numbers are much smaller, and restricted to older women. Women in their twenties, thirties and forties who have dropped out of the labour force largely cite household work and childcare as the reasons they left the workforce.

Childcare is a particularly important reason cited by young women, or those in their twenties. More than three in ten women between the ages of 20-29 years who were earlier working report childcare as the reason they do not work anymore.

As women grow older, household work and health become more prominent reasons to quit work. Across all age groups in the prime working ages, however, household work remains the leading reason women leave the labour force.

Read more about which Indian women are most likely to be in the labour force.