02092nam a22001577a 4500 528416 528416 241204b ||||| |||| 00| 0 eng d Abdullah, Basit Abraham, Vinoj and Ritika Jain, 60654 Youth unemployment in India: Do aspirations matter? Indian Journal of Labour Economics 67(3), Sep, 2024: p.883-908 An often discussed but less researched dimension of youth unemployment is voluntary unemployment caused by the mismatch between available opportunities in the labour market and employment aspirations. In this paper, we attempt to explore this misalignment between employment aspirations and the jobs in the labour market as a factor responsible for higher incidence of unemployment among youth. We build a measure of relative occupational aspirations based on the premise that aspirations are shaped by the socio-economic context and educational attainment of an individual. Our analysis provides evidence for a lack of employment opportunities that satisfy the employment aspirations of the youth. The mismatch between aspirations and opportunities measured as relative occupational aspirations gap, is particularly high among youth with tertiary education, and female youth have higher aspirations gap compared to males. Based on our analysis, which includes both multinomial probit and instrument variable (IV) probit models, we find that youth with higher aspirations gap are more likely to be unemployed. We argue that increasing educational levels raise job-related expectations and aspirations. The lack of quality employment opportunities matching the aspirations could be a contributing factor to higher unemployment among youth. An effective policy approach requires the creation of better-quality jobs that align with the aspirations of young, educated labour force.- Reproduced https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s41027-024-00510-8 Youth, Employment, Aspirations, Unemployment. v 49300 Indian Journal of Labour Economics EMPLOYMENT AR 0 0 ddc 0 0 403509 IIPA IIPA 2024-12-04 67(3), Sep, 2024: p.883-908 AR133808 2024-12-04 AR