Unemployment woes

Pakistan's demographic profile is often described as a "youth bulge", but without urgent and sustained job creation, it risks becoming a source of instability rather than an economic dividend. That warning, delivered bluntly by World Bank President Ajay Banga, should concentrate minds in Islamabad. Over the next decade, Pakistan must generate between 25 and 30 million jobs — roughly 2.5 to 3 million every year - or face the twin dangers of domestic unrest and accelerating outward migration.

Millions of young Pakistanis are entering working age in an economy that has struggled to expand, repeatedly stalled by macroeconomic instability and policy uncertainty. The consequences are already visible. Nearly 4,000 doctors left the country in 2025 alone — the highest annual outflow on record — reflecting how even highly trained professionals see few incentives to stay amid poor working conditions and limited career prospects.

Pakistan is currently navigating an IMF stabilisation programme while preparing to implement a 10-year Country Partnership Framework with the World Bank, which envisages around $4 billion a year in combined public and private financing. That framework recognises that the state has limited fiscal space and the private sector already generates 90% of jobs.

Without a thriving private economy, job creation on the scale required is simply not possible. The sectors identified as labour-intensive - infrastructure, primary healthcare, tourism and small-scale agriculture — offer a practical starting point. Agriculture alone could account for a third of the jobs Pakistan needs to create by mid-century, but it remains trapped in low productivity and informality. Meanwhile, the country's growing pool of freelancers shows clear entrepreneurial energy, but few are able to scale into firms that employ others, largely due to lack of credit, infrastructure and regulatory support. What is at stake is generational. If inequality is deepened, it will push more young Pakistanis to seek livelihoods abroad, hollowing out the country's human capital.