The study examines the structure of the Indian workforce, analyses the long term and short term trends in the real daily wage rates in both pre and post-liberalization phases in different states, highlights the inequality in wage payments within the different segments of the labour market, and assesses the magnitude of the working poor and incidence of poverty among different types of workers.

The findings of the paper show that the wage differential across different segments has been on the rise in the post-liberalization period. Gender differentials continue to exist, but have been declining over the years. Wage growth in the informal non-agriculture sector has decelerated and casual workers, particularly in the agricultural sector, have witnessed the slowest increase in wages during the post-liberalization period. The inequality in wage payment within each segment of the labour market also shows an increasing trend during the post-liberalization period. Further, the increase in wages has lagged behind increase in labour productivity all through the post-liberalization period. Education plays a very important role in ensuring higher wages for both regular and casual workers. The authors argue that the Minimum Wages Act is still poorly implemented, particularly in rural areas, and a large proportion of agricultural workers continue to get less than minimum wages. All these have resulted in high incidence of poverty among workers in general and casual workers in particular. The study highlights the need to enhance the educational and skill capabilities of workers to combat poverty.