The appearance of synthetic intelligence has created legitimate considerations about lack of jobs regardless of the quite a few alternatives that may emerge in sure segments. And whereas some dangers have already materialised even in India – fintech agency PhonePe, for example, minimize its customer support workforce by 60% within the 5 years ended 2023-24 resulting from elevated use of AI-driven chatbots – the state of affairs is especially perilous for the youth.
In line with US-based enterprise capital agency SignalFire’s State of Tech Expertise Report 2025, launched on Might 20, hiring of contemporary graduates by massive expertise companies in 2024 was down greater than 50 per cent in comparison with 2019, whereas the decline was greater than 30 per cent for start-ups. “As budgets tighten and AI capabilities enhance, corporations are decreasing their funding in new grad alternatives,” SignalFire mentioned.
Youth unemployment
For Indian youth, circumstances are already troublesome. In line with the statistics ministry’s inaugural month-to-month Periodic Labour Drive Survey launched earlier this month, the unemployment fee for Indians within the 15-29 years age bracket was as excessive as 13.8 per cent in April 2025, greater than twice the all-India unemployment fee of 5.1 per cent, based mostly on the present weekly standing method which measures unemployment by contemplating these individuals who had been obtainable for work for a minimum of one hour on any day within the seven days previous the survey
Longer-term tendencies don’t paint an encouraging image both. In line with a Centre for Social and Financial Progress paper ‘India at Work: Employment Developments within the twenty first Century’ launched final week, an evaluation of knowledge going again to 1983 exhibits that whereas the variety of employed individuals within the 15-24 age class elevated to six.20 crore in 2023-24 from 5.24 crore in 2017-18, “over an extended interval, there was a decline or stagnation”.
Jobs for India’s youth stagnating or declining over longer interval
Supply: Centre for Social and Financial Progress paper (Knowledge visualisation by Vibha B Madhava)
Studying alternatives
To make certain, stagnant youth employment is a mirrored image of the paucity of jobs. However to organize for a future which can current extra alternatives, the important thing could also be to seemingly get with the programme and “grow to be a type of ninja utilizing the most recent (AI) instruments,” Demis Hassabis, co-founder of Google DeepMind, mentioned on The New York Occasions’ Onerous Fork podcast final week.
The issue for younger Indians, nevertheless, could be a deeper one. As per the Indian statistics ministry’s newest Time Use Survey, these within the 15-29 age group who had been concerned in studying spent 422 minutes per day on ‘studying actions’ in 2024, down 8 minutes per day from 2019.
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In the meantime, although most younger Indians are pretty acquainted in relation to smartphones and the web, their proficiency with primary duties is just not encouraging. In line with the statistics ministry’s Complete Annual Modular Survey for 2022-23 (July-June), whereas 84.2 per cent of individuals from throughout India within the 15-29 age bucket had been ready to make use of the web, simply 28.5 per cent may seek for info, ship or obtain e-mails, and carry out on-line banking transactions. Even when solely these dwelling in city areas are thought of, the proportion stays beneath half at 42.6 per cent.
Closing doorways
Whereas the usage of AI in excessive quantity and repetitive duties – corresponding to chat automation and digital advertising and marketing – frees up people for extra strategic and artistic actions, it additionally considerably shuts the door for contemporary graduates who begin on the backside and transfer up the ladder.
The youth are already feeling the warmth, with Gen Z staff within the US considerably extra pessimistic than different generations, as per LinkedIn Market Analysis. In April 2025, their job confidence rating – measured on a scale from -100 to +100 – fell 7 factors year-on-year to +24. Compared, child boomers had a rating of +44, with millennials at +40.
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