Is India running out of time to cash in on its booming young workforce?

India isn’t doing enough to revamp its education system to prepare the youth for better-paying, high-skilled jobs, going by a recent World Bank report

Economy News: India, which is home to more young people than any other country, is running out of time to harness the potential of its youth to drive economic growth. The nation’s population in the under-19 age group has already peaked, government data show. That means the labor force will grow more slowly from here on out. In just over 20 years, the South Asian nation will be an aging society, similar to where China is now, according to the Economic Survey published by the Finance Ministry earlier this month.

With those risks looming, India isn’t doing enough to revamp its education system to prepare the youth for better-paying, high-skilled jobs, going by a recent World Bank report. The world’s sixth-biggest economy, and until recently the fastest-growing major one, is ranked 115 out of 157 countries in the Human Capital Index, which measures the investment in education and health care for young people.

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman’s budget this month allocated 3.4 per cent of total annual spending to the ministry in charge of education, little changed from the last few years and down from 3.8 per cent in 2015. The government’s own review of public schools says “it is common knowledge” that the country’s education system suffers from a shortage of teachers and staff, poor teacher training and delays in receiving funds.