High Growth, Fewer Jobs

Bangladesh’s tremendous economic growth has been unable to create jobs proportionately over the past decade, raising questions about the significance of the growth for a large section of the population.

Besides, female participation in the labour force shrank in the last nine years, especially in rural areas, according to a government study on employment, productivity and sectoral investment in Bangladesh.  

Employment elasticity, which indicates the ability of an economy to generate employment opportunities for its population as percent of its growth process, declined between fiscal 2005-06 and 2017-18, when the economy was apparently on tremendous growth momentum.

Between fiscal 2005-06 and 2009-10, the country’s employment elasticity was 0.55. It plunged to 0.25 between fiscal 2010-11 and 2017-18, when the economy averaged 6.6 percent GDP growth.

Employment elasticity is a measure of the percentage change in employment associated with a 1 percentage point change in economic growth.

Automation or advanced technology may displace some workers but this will be compensated by jobs created elsewhere in the economy.

“However, since further advancement of technology will require high-skilled labour, focusing on demand-driven skill development system should be the priority for Bangladesh,” it added.