The Drèze DUET: Towards employment as a universal right
Published in Ideas for India , September 11, 2020. Jean Drèze has recently proposed a "Decentralised Urban Employment and Training" Scheme, or DUET for short. In his words, "DUET could act as a step towards urban employment guarantee." The essential idea is for state governments to issue job stamps to “approved public institutions”, who would use these to pay wages to suitably registered workers. Workers would present job stamps and a work certificate (from the institution) for reimbursement directly into a bank account. I refer you to Jean's proposal for more detail. I personally believe that we should push forward with the agenda of employment as a universal right, one that transcends rural versus urban. DUET would move that needle. With the rising tendency to displace labour – a trend that will only be heightened by the pandemic – such a right provides protection, at least to some minimal degree. So I support this proposal. That said, there are many issue...