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IIM Indore

This paper focuses on spatial disparities in household earnings in rural and urban India. A point of departure from the existing literature on inequality in India is that we focus on household earnings rather than consumption expenditure. We analyse data from the nationally representative Periodic Labour Force Survey 2018-19. We provide a rich description of distribution of rural and urban monthly per capita household earning at the national and sub-national level and estimates of earnings inequality. While there are a multitude of factors that affect the evolution of income inequality, we focus on the salience of urbanization in explaining differences in inequality at the sub-national level vis a vis India. The results of the decomposition exercise help identify the proximate factors behind inequality differentials across various states. We situate our findings within the Kuznets framework and the stylized facts in the extant literature.&nbsp;

Economics

World University root node

Indira Gandhi Institute of Development Research, Mumbai Working Papers

Spatial disparities in household earnings in India: Role of urbanization, sectoral inequalities and rural-urban differences

This paper examines whether participation in workfare and food grain subsidy programs in India impacts health and nutritional status of women and children in participating households, using short-term morbidity and body mass index (BMI) as indicators. Using the Indian Human Development Survey (IHDS), a nationally representative panel data survey conducted in 2005 and 2012, we estimate average treatment effects for participants using a semi-parametric differences-in-differences and a regression-based DID using a sample matched on the propensity scores. We find that participation in these programs lowers morbidity for women by upto 28. We also find evidence, though statistically weaker, that participation increases women's BMI, at least in states implementing those programs well. For children, we find generally positive impacts of household participation in these programs on their BMI, however there is no robust evidence of any impact on their morbidity. Our results suggest that social protection programs can operate synergistically and deliver positive impacts on children and women's nutrition or health, even though this is not their main objective. At the same time, the effects are heterogeneous, confirming that benefits of programs are mediated by intrahousehold dynamics.

Fulltext

SSRN Electronic Journal

Synergies in Social Protection: Impacts of India’s MGNREGA and Public Distribution System on the Health and Nutrition of Women and Children

This paper is a contribution to understanding income generation and inequality in India's agricultural sector. We analyze the National Sample Surveys of agriculture in 2003 and 2013 using descriptive and regression based methods, and estimate income inequality in the agricultural sector at the scale of the nation and its 17 largest states. We show that: (a) there are significant state-level differences in the structures/patterns of income generation from agriculture, (b) there is a negative relationship between the amount of land owned by the household and share of wages in total income, (c) income inequality in India's agricultural sector is very high (Gini Coefficient of around 0.6 during the period), and (d) about half of the income inequality is explained by the household-level variance in income from cultivation, which in turn is primarily dependent on variance in landownership. © 2019 The Authors. Review of Income and Wealth published by John Wiley &amp; Sons Ltd on behalf of International Association for Research in Income and Wealth.

Review of Income and Wealth

Land Distribution, Income Generation and Inequality in India's Agricultural Sector

The literature on unemployment in India has not given adequate attention to the analysis of unemployment spells. This paper attempts to fill this gap by focusing on the trends in the incidence and distribution of unemployment spells from 1993 to 2012. It was found that shorter unemployment spells of up to two months are more prevalent in rural areas, primarily for casual labour who experience a break in their employment due to lack of work. On the other hand, longer spells of more than 6 months are predominant in urban areas, experienced predominantly by young, well-educated population, who do not come from the poorest households, and do not have any previous job market experience. Further, the incidence as well as the contribution to longer durations of unemployment is higher in the eastern region and females are more likely than males to experience them. The author discusses the findings, their policy implications, and suggests ways to improve upon the available data so that it can help in developing a better understanding of the factors contributing to unemployment.

The Indian Journal of Labour Economics

Unemployment Spells in India: Patterns, Trends, and Covariates

What is the intensity and level of domestic tourism in rural and urban India? What are the key reasons for households’ domestic tourism trips? What can we understand from domestic tourism patterns in India? Using National Sample Survey Office data on domestic tourism (2014–15), some of these questions are answered.

Economic and Political Weekly

Domestic tourism in India (2014-15): Evidence from NSSO

We develop a measure of unemployment that takes into account both the duration and intensity of unemployment. This measure satisfies several desirable properties, including distribution sensitivity, which deals with differences among the unemployed. It is particularly suited to developing countries because individuals in these countries display considerable variation in labor force participation, unemployment duration, and unemployment intensity. It can also be decomposed into mean and variance components and contributions to unemployment by various subgroups of the population. We use this measure and data from National Sample Surveys on employment and unemployment to understand unemployment in India during the period 1993 to 2012. We show that unemployment has generally fallen, although the distribution of unemployment has worsened. Moreover, unemployment is driven to a greater extent by higher educated groups; the unemployment among these groups is also fairly substantial. We explain these findings and suggest some policies.

Review of Development Economics

Unemployment burden and its distribution: Theory and evidence from India

The study carries out epidemiological transition analysis of disease burden from 1995 to 2014 in India and States for selected diseases. Disability Adjusted Life Years (DALY) methodology has been adapted for disease burden estimation using Medical Certification of Cause of Death (MCCD) and Sample Registration Survey data. The study further elaborates on the essence of decomposition into age structure, death rate and age at death in order to better analyze health system progression. Results indicate wide diversity among states in bearing the burden of communicable, non-communicable and injury. Some states like Bihar, Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh are facing the dual burden of diseases. Findings of the study would be useful in tailoring health care expenditures at regional level based on population health needs thus improving technical and allocative efficiency of health systems.

IARIW-ICIER Conference

Distribution of Disease Burden and Epidemiological Transition in the Indian States: 1995-2014

Can large-scale social safety nets be nutrition sensitive even if they do not explicitly incorporate health and nutrition as programmatic goals? This paper focuses on the consequences of a countrywide guaranteed workfare programme (MGNREGA) and subsidised food distribution scheme (PDS) in India for the prevalence of anaemia, examining whether individuals in districts with a broader reach of these mega-programmes are less likely to be anaemic. Using an Instrumental Variable (IV) approach to address the endogeneity of programme scale, we find that an individual residing in a district where the programmes have broader reach is less likely to suffer from all forms of anaemia and has a lower haemoglobin deficit from the benchmark suggested by the World Health Organisation (WHO) – ranging between 0.91 to 6.2 percentage points for a 10 percentage point expansion in programme scale. While the PDS seems to be more effective in reducing the incidence of mild anaemia than moderate or severe anaemia, while the strength of effects for MGNREGA seem to be the least for mild. These are catch-all effects that represent partial and general equilibrium impacts through multiple pathways. Programme interaction effects suggest the MGNREGA and PDS may be substitutes – associated improvements in anaemia for regions with higher PDS access (MGNREGA participation) are more pronounced when the scale of MGNREGA participation (PDS access) is low. There exist nonlinearities in these relationships, with the efficacy of both programmes varying across scales of implementation.

Can Social Safety Nets Protect Public Health? The Effect of India's Workfare and Foodgrain Subsidy Programmes on Anaemia

In developing countries, lack of formal contract enforcement mechanisms is compensated by informal governance enforced through trust, kinship, reputation, etc. This paper focuses on one such setting in India's urban informal economy: the ‘day labour’ market for casual labour. We survey seven such markets in Navi Mumbai (a city on the outskirts of Mumbai), and find considerable incidence of contract enforcement problems in the form of employers reneging on wage payments to labourers. We find that payments to labourers with access to social networks and a record of work done are less likely to be reneged. Further, consistent with the literature on the limits of informal enforcement, we find that labourers in large markets, with greater linguistic and caste-based diversity, are more likely to be reneged. We argue that interventions aimed at facilitating access to formal mechanisms might help overcome some of the limitations with informal enforcement.

Journal of Institutional Economics

Impediments to contract enforcement in day labour markets: A perspective from India

The impact of labour regulations on economic activity and formal sector job growth has been an issue of considerable interest in academic as well as policy circles in the Indian context. Two characteristic features of this debate stand out: first, the relative overemphasis on select aspects of labour regulations pertaining to job security provisions (in particular, the Chapters V-A and V-B of the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947 (IDA)); second, the relative under emphasis on the extent and nature of compliance with the labour regulations. The focus on select labour laws pertaining to job security provisions, such as the IDA, has come at the cost of a relative neglect of the impact of other labour regulations on worker welfare that, given their lower firm size thresholds combined with the preponderance of small sized firms in the Indian economy, affect a much larger set of firms and workers employed in them. But before we look at the impact of labour regulations, it is pertinent to ask the extent to which these regulations are complied with, so that the debate on their impact is situated in ground realities. Given that regulations are weakly enforced in developing countries such as India, it is surprising that there has not been an adequate emphasis on arriving at the estimates of non-compliance with India’s labour laws. In this essay, we look at compliance with an important labour regulation pertaining to workers’ social security: the Employees Provident Fund and Miscellaneous Provisions Act, 1952 (EPF). Under this, establishments employing 20 or more workers are mandated to provide contributions towards the provident fund of those employees whose wages are below a certain threshold. We focus on the EPF for the following reasons: first, unlike the IDA or the Factories’ Act 1948 which are applicable only to the manufacturing sector, the EPF has a wider coverage in terms of sectors of work; second, the government's recent initiatives on EPF, in the form of subsidizing employers' contributions, demonstrate its belief in the scheme's potential to be an important tool for delivering social security to workers. Moreover, jobs with social security form the basis for achieving ‘decent work for all’, a key sustainable development goal adopted by the United Nations. Since 2004-05, the National Sample Surveys on Employment and Unemployment (NSS) have captured workers’ self-reported data on access to various social security provisions, including provident fund contributions by the employers. Our estimates from this data suggest that the evasion of the EPF Act is quite widespread: in 2011-12, 75 percent (6.6 million) of regular salaried employees earning wages below the threshold and working in establishments employing 20 or more workers have reported to be not receiving provident fund benefits. This has increased sharply from 46 percent (4.5 million) in 2004-05. These individuals constitute about 10 percent of the total workforce employed in regular salaried jobs, in the respective years. We find that lack of written job contracts is an important correlate of non-compliance with the Act. We discuss various pathways that might lead to this correlation and suggest avenues for future research.

India Development Report

Labour Regulations and Worker Welfare: The Case of Provident Fund in India

This paper is a contribution to understanding income generation and inequality in India's agricultural sector. We analyse the National Sample Surveys of agriculture in 2003 and 2013 using descriptive, decomposition, and modelling tools, and estimate income inequality in the agricultural sector at the scale of the nation and its 17 largest states. We show that: (a) income inequality in India's agricultural sector is very high (Gini Coefficient of around 0.6 during the period), (b) about half of the income inequality is explained by the household-level variance in income from cultivation, which in turn is primarily dependent on variance in landownership, and (c) there are significant state-level differences in the structures/patterns of income generation from agriculture. These findings are important for two principal reasons. First, these measurements of inequality challenge the widely-held belief-based on consumption rather than income data-that India is a low-inequality country. Second, these findings reinforce the idea that the extreme fragmentation of agricultural land is the root cause of poverty in India, and the fact that the fragmentation continues to grow more intense is the singular challenge of Indian developmen

Indira Gandhi Institute of Development Research

Income generation and inequality in India's agricultural sector: The consequences of land fragmentation

We investigate the relationship between growth and deprivation in India, an issue of immense interest. Given that there is continuing controversy over poverty lines, we use a framework that rigorously addresses this issue over a range of poverty lines. Using National Sample Surveys on consumption expenditure, we show that while growth has “trickled down”, it has not benefited the poor sufficiently. Extending this framework, we show that growth has not benefited the poor among disadvantaged caste groups and lower classes adequately. Our findings raise concerns about the “inclusiveness” of Indian growth. We discuss plausible explanations for our findings and policy implications. © 2014 Oxford Department of International Development.

Oxford Development Studies

Growth and Deprivation in India: What does Recent Evidence Suggest on “Inclusiveness”?

Predicting the binding mode of flexible polypeptides to proteins is an important task that falls outside the domain of applicability of most small molecule and protein−protein docking tools. Here, we test the small molecule flexible ligand docking program Glide on a set of 19 non-$α$-helical peptides and systematically improve pose prediction accuracy by enhancing Glide sampling for flexible polypeptides. In addition, scoring of the poses was improved by post-processing with physics-based implicit solvent MM- GBSA calculations. Using the best RMSD among the top 10 scoring poses as a metric, the success rate (RMSD ≤ 2.0 \AA for the interface backbone atoms) increased from 21% with default Glide SP settings to 58% with the enhanced peptide sampling and scoring protocol in the case of redocking to the native protein structure. This approaches the accuracy of the recently developed Rosetta FlexPepDock method (63% success for these 19 peptides) while being over 100 times faster. Cross-docking was performed for a subset of cases where an unbound receptor structure was available and in that case, 40% of peptides were docked successfully. We analyze the results and find that the optimized polypeptide protocol is most accurate for extended peptides of limited size and number of formal charges, defining a domain of applicability for this approach.