Formal job creation surged in 2021-22 on the back of faster economic recovery post Covid. Payroll data for the last fiscal shows 58.7% increase in net new employment under the Employees’ Provident Fund Organisation in 2021-22, 29.6% surge in new subscribers under the Employees’ State Insurance Corporation and 23.4% increase in the number of subscribers under the National Pension Scheme.
While the number of net new subscribers under EPFO surpassed all records and stood at 12.2 million compared to 7.7 million new subscribers added in 2020-21, net addition under ESIC stood at 14.9 million as against 11.5 million in the preceding year while the new subscribers under NPS were higher at 0.77 million compared to 0.62 million in 2020-21.
As per the provisional payroll data, released by the ministry of statistics and programme implementation on Wednesday, new subscribers added to EPFO and NPS were all time high in the last fiscal while the subscriber base of ESIC, though higher than 2020-21, is still below the pre-Covid years.
“The present report gives different perspectives on the levels of employment in the formal sector and does not measure employment at a holistic level,” the ministry said in a statement. “The numbers of subscribers are from various sources and there are elements of overlap. Therefore, the estimates from various sources are not additive,” it added.
In the month of March, net new enrollments under EPFO stood at 1.53 million, the highest addition in a month in the last fiscal, and a jump of 19.5% compared to February when it stood at 1.28 million. This is on the back of several new establishments that have come into the EPFO fold for the first time and remitted contributions of its employees with the retirement fund body.
New subscribers under ESIC were 10.6% higher in March at 1.40 million compared to 1.27 million in February while the National Pension Scheme registered a jump of 17.5% to 75,931 as against 64,611 added in February.
The NSO report is based on the payroll data of new subscribers of various social security schemes run by ESIC, the Employees' Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) and Pension Fund Regulatory and Development Authority (PFRDA). It has been releasing such data of these bodies since April 2018, covering the period starting from September 2017.
Source Name:-Economic Times