The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has acknowledged that unemployment is one of the most serious socio-economic problems that India is facing today. However, it also exuded confidence that a number of reforms being carried out for the past few years would end up creating relatively more jobs in the country. Noting that India has been one of the fastest growing large economies in recent times, the IMF spokesperson, Gerry Rice said that this has led to improvement in poverty reduction and improvements in standard of living.
Rice has said that their view is that recent reforms, particularly the implementation of a nationwide Goods and Services Tax (GST) regime, should help boost efficiency and productivity, and overtime will help create jobs in the formal sector. In addition, he noted that the government recently took steps towards labor market flexibility by modifying labor rules. He added that these reforms will help to increase employment, perhaps not overnight but over the medium term.
The IMF spokesperson further stated that the continuation of micro economic policies, structural forms including reforms in the labor market, will not only boosts India’s long-term growth but create jobs as well. He believed that all of this will help to spur India’s continuing catch up with advanced economies and create many jobs that are needed to employ people who are going to labor force.