Causes of unemployment in Pakistan

Idle person is a devils workshop’, workless people can always be dangerous to a country’s security. It is most likely that citizens unable to find a job, unable to earn an honest living, end up turning to alternatives to beg or snatch their food, one of the common problems in third world countries.

Recently, the unemployment rate of Pakistan increased to 6.5% and so it can be said that one out of every 10 people of the country are suffering from unemployment. The unemployment rate in urban areas of Pakistan increased by 2% to 10.1%, whereas, the unemployment rate in rural areas increased from 4.3% to 5%.   

Significant reasons for unemployment in Pakistan include lack of political infrastructure, incompatibility in the job opportunities, lack of interest in technical education, political dominancy, rural to urban migration, child labor, double standards in the implantation of the merit policy and ever increasing population of Pakistan.

Around 80% of the educational institutions in Pakistan are under government. So, our educational institutions and technical institutions do not equip the students properly to suit international and at times even local markets.  The academic circular is outdated and sometimes even irrelevant. Hence to improve the unemployment problem, government needs to bring in fundamental structure changes in entire education system.

In addition to this, problems such as lack of availability of imported raw material, low demand in local markets, competition with imported goods and competitiveness of products in international markets, have collapsed many industries in Pakistan. This down fall in industries is causing unemployment in the country. Privatization policy of government is further increasing the unemployment.         

Furthermore Pakistan, an agricultural based economy, is currently undergoing the process of mechanization. Labor is being replaced by machines, creating unemployment in rural areas.  This increases rural to urban migration, which only creates more problems as cities are already at their saturation level.

Last but not the least, problem of high birth rate is common in third world countries. Issues arise when this increased population looks up to society for job opportunities, but the fact is only job seekers have increased not the job opportunities.