Women’s Workforce in Assam: Insights on Composition and Determinants from PLFS Data

Abstract

This article attempts to analyse the composition and determinants of workforce participation among the females in Assam, a relatively less researched part of India. Unit-level data has been extracted from Periodic Labour Force Survey (PLFS), 2018–2019, and a binary logistic regression model has been used to identify some of the socio-economic and demographic factors that influence the odds of Assamese females being a part of the workforce in both the rural and the urban sectors along with the extent of their influence. The results show that age, educational qualification, marital status and social group have significant impact on workforce participation. The majority of Assamese women in the rural areas are found to be engaged in the growing of tea, while in the urban areas, they are primarily employed in the education sector. Moreover, though a bulk of the women workforce in Assam are engaged in regular wage/salaried forms of employment, more than one-third of them do not receive any social security benefit.