India's Gender Employment Gap Report

A white paper by the Centre for Finance and Economics Research (CFER) at Great Lakes Institute of Management reveals a stark gender gap in employment in India. Only 18% of young women aged 20-29 are in paid employment, compared to 79% of young men, despite near gender parity in higher education. This disparity is particularly pronounced in states like India — Bihar, India — Uttar Pradesh, India — Uttarakhand, and India — Jammu and Kashmir. The study attributes this to structural barriers such as housing, mobility, and safety, rather than a lack of willingness to work. It also notes a significant formal-informal divide affecting women's work hours more severely and an 'invisible burden' of unpaid care work. The report recommends interventions including removing constraints to women's employment, accelerating formalization, addressing overwork and spatial mismatch, and tackling underemployment to leverage India's demographic dividend.