The Dependency Ratio in India is declining because

Question

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Correct — C, population of 15-59 years is relatively high. The dependency ratio sets the population presumed not to be economically productive — conventionally children aged 0-14 and persons aged 60 and above, in the Indian convention — against the working-age population in between. Written out, it is (0-14 plus 60 and above) divided by (15-59), usually multiplied by 100. Because it is a ratio, it falls only when the denominator grows faster than the numerator. That is exactly what India has been going through: fertility has been declining for decades, so each new cohort of children is proportionately smaller and the 0-14 share keeps shrinking, while the very large cohorts born in the high-fertility decades have moved into the 15-59 band. Life expectancy has risen, but the 60-plus share is still comparatively small, so it has not yet offset the fall in the child share. The result is a working-age population that is large relative to dependants — the condition economists call India's demographic dividend — and a dependency ratio that is falling. Note how cleanly the options separate: (a), (b) and (d) all describe parts of the numerator, and a bigger numerator would raise the ratio. Only (c) describes the denominator.

Why the other options are wrong — (a) The 0-14 group is the child-dependency part of the numerator. A relatively large child population pushes the dependency ratio up, not down — and in any case India's 0-14 share has been shrinking as fertility falls, which is one of the two reasons the ratio is declining.  (b) The 60-plus group is the old-age-dependency part of the numerator, so a high elderly share also raises the ratio. India's elderly share is indeed rising and will eventually push the dependency ratio back up, closing the demographic dividend window — but that works in the opposite direction from the decline the question describes.  (d) This is the entire numerator. If both dependent groups were relatively large the ratio would be at its highest, not declining. It is the classic 'sum of two wrong answers' option, and it is tempting only because it correctly names the two dependent age groups.

Concept: The dependency ratio is a demographic accounting device, not a measure of who actually works. It divides the population into three age bands and asks how many people in the notionally dependent bands each hundred people of working age must support. Indian official practice uses 0-14 and 60-plus as the dependent bands with 15-59 as working age; United Nations and World Bank series usually use 15-64 with 65-plus as elderly, so the same country can show two different ratios depending on the source. The total ratio splits into a child dependency ratio and an old-age dependency ratio, and the two move in opposite directions as a country passes through the demographic transition. Fertility falls first, so the child ratio drops for several decades while the elderly ratio is still small; the total ratio therefore dips, and that dip is the demographic dividend window. Later, as the large working-age cohorts themselves age, old-age dependency rises and the total ratio climbs again.

State PCS 2019 Q109 — Economy PYQ with Answer

State PCS 2019 Q109 — Economy PYQ with Answer