Consumer Price Index for Industrial Workers (CPI-IW)

Government has released the new series of Consumer Price Index for Industrial Worker (CPI-IW) with base year 2016, being compiled and maintained by Labour Bureau, an attached office of Ministry of Labour& Employment. 

Daily Current Affairs Quiz 2020

Key-Points

The new series of CPI(IW) with base 2016=100 will replace theexisting series with base2001=100.

The revision in base year will reflect changing consumption pattern of the working-class population over the years.

Following the change in base year, the index will give 39% weight to food and beverage consumption of workers now as against 46.2% earlier. In contrast, spending on housing will get almost 17% weight as against 15.2% earlier.

Among consumption categories, a segment comprising spending on heads like education, health and transport by workers has been given a sizable jump in weight from 23% earlier to 30% now.

The CPI-IW is used as a benchmark for calculating dearness allowance for government employees, dearness relief for pensioners and wages for industrial workers in some sectors.

Though it may not impact the salary of industrial workers and DA of government staff immediately, it will have a cascading impact on salary, DA and DR of workers, and pensioners.