Lawless: A Policy Perspective on Labour Laws and Migrant Workers Displaced by COVID-19
24 Pages Posted: 31 Dec 2020
Date Written: October 14, 2020
Abstract
Many of India’s 19mn migrant workers have been displaced as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic and associated lockdown. Save for a select few that received assistance from their employers and local governments, many migrants were left to make their own arrangements to return home. This paper investigates the role of labour laws and policies in overcoming the adverse effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, and this unequal impact on migrant workers. Given that consolidation and strengthening of labour laws and codes in India is a recent phenomenon, this paper argues that there is an opportunity to account for vulnerabilities faced by migrant laborers in particular. We review recent bills such as the Occupational Safety, Health and Working Conditions Code recently passed by Parliament (2020). We provide a roadmap of labour laws and policies potentially required to safeguard migrant and minimum wage labourers from such shocks in the future.
Keywords: minimum wage, occupational safety, vulnerability, pandemic planning
JEL Classification: D78, J61, J83, K31
Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation