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India, Inc.'s wage bill soars by 17% in FY05
By agencies
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Monday, 16 May 2005, 19:30 IST |
1 Comments
NEW DELHI: There is good news for IndiaÂ’s industrial workers. If they were the victims of industrial recession in the past, they are now the beneficiaries of an industrial turnaround.
As demand picked up and Corporate India recorded robust growth in both turnover and margins in Â’04-05, the workers have witnessed a sharp rise in their earnings, financial daily Economic Times reports.
A survey of 200 large companies finds that their aggregate wage bill has increased by a record 16.6 percent in Â’04-05 over Â’03-04. At the individual level, more than four-fifths of the sample companies have witnessed a rise in their wage bills during this period.
The magnitude of the rise would have probably been even higher, but for the poor performance of public sector undertakings (PSUs).
The aggregate wage bill of 20 PSUs in the list has increased by just about 6 percent during this period. The aggregate wage bill of 180 private sector companies, in contrast, has increased by 20.1 percent, the report said.
This is significant, for, in the reform years, not only had a large number of workers lost their jobs, but they had also witnessed a less than proportionate rise in their wages. The current industrial recovery has improved their earnings, as also employment opportunities.