Saket Kumar
Chennai
4 October, 2024
The death of Anna Sebastian Perayil, an employee at a member firm of Ernst & Young (EY), has sparked a debate over workload among professionals in India.
Perayil’s mother, Anita Augustine, wrote a letter to Rajiv memani, chairman of EY India alleging that her daughter died because of work stress.
An analysis of the data on the mean weekly work hours and average monthly earnings of high-skilled employees reveals that Indian employees work for the longest hours globally. They also earn less than their counterparts in other nations.
The International Labour Organization (ILO) classifies high-skilled occupations into two levels–those that require higher education for at least three years (Skill level 3) and others that need higher education for a minimum of six years (Skill level 4). Perayil, a Chartered Accountant, belonged to the latter category.
Globally, high-skilled employees in India work for the longest hours. 46 countries, including India, submitted data on the mean weekly work hours of high-skilled employees working in three broad sectors– industry, agriculture, and services to the ILO in 2023.
In India, such employees worked for 54 hours a week in 2023. It means that in a five-day work week, they worked for almost 11 hours a day, and for a six-day work week, 9 hours a day.
Chart 1 shows that high-skilled employees in India (a lower middle-income country) work for longer hours than their counterparts in high-income (USA), upper-middle-income (Argentina), lower-middle-income (Vietnam), and even low-income countries like Rwanda.
Data show that even as high-skilled employees in India work for the longest hours globally, it does not result in consumerate pay.
32 countries submitted data on the average monthly earnings of high-skilled employees to the ILO in 2023. Among these, India ranked 22nd in terms of average monthly earnings measured in Purchasing Power Parity (in US dollars).
Chart 2 illustrates that high-skilled employees in India earn an average of $1,685 per month. This amount is only a quarter of what their counterparts make in high-income nations such as the United States, a third of the earnings in Switzerland, and half of those in Britain.
Additionally, their income falls below that of employees in upper-middle-income countries like Argentina and Mauritius, as well as lower-middle-income nations such as Bolivia
A 2022 study by Deloitte on Mental Health and Well-being in the Workplace found the workplace to be the top stressor among white-collar workers. Out of 3304 workers surveyed, 47 percent of respondents reported experiencing workplace-related stress. At the same time, 46 percent complained of stress due to financial issues. (See Chart 3 below).
“Deadlines, heavy workloads, poor team cultures, and lack of recognition and job satisfaction have contributed to workplace-related stress,” the report said.