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Poverty & Inequality

Why are canteens important when 800 million people get free grains?

  • Notes from the Field

The problem of India’s stagnant real wages

New data from the Labour Bureau and the National Sample Survey Office point to a virtual stagnation of real wages in India over the past decade. In this post, Das and Drèze argue that this trend poin...

  • Perspectives

Rethinking social safety nets in a changing society

This paper was coauthored by Debasis Barik, Pallavi Choudhuri, Bijay Chouhan, Om Prakash Sharma, Dinesh Kumar Tiwari (NCAER) and Sharan Sharma (University of Maryland College Park and NCAER). Histori...

  • Articles

Determining how many Indians are poor today

Poverty debates in India have seen a revival since the release of a fact sheet from the 2022-23 household consumption expenditure survey. In this post, Ghatak and Kumar note that the general consensus...

  • Perspectives
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Focussing on inequality of opportunity to sustain India’s growth

India has seen a four-fold increase in average incomes since 1990, which has reduced the share of the population living in absolute poverty from 45% to 20%. Yet, there are large and widening inequalit...

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How has the Covid-19 crisis affected the urban poor? Findings from a phone survey - III

While the devastating impact of the second Covid-19 on public health in India is well-known, there is relatively little evidence on its economic and psychological dimensions. Based on surveys in indus...

  • Notes from the Field

The changing demand for welfare in rural Pakistan

The proliferation of cash transfer programmes in developing countries has raised concern regarding a crowding-out effect on citizens' demands for investment in universal public services. Based on a ho...

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The Covid-19 crisis and food security

India’s national lockdown in 2020, imposed to contain the spread of Covid-19, threw millions of people out of work and sharply reduced earnings for those who remained employed. Based on data from mu...

  • Perspectives

Covid-19: Health and economic impacts in Indian slums

Initial predictions suggested that slum communities – densely packed, with shared water taps, and an impossibility of social distancing – would be particularly hard-hit by Covid-19. In this note, ...

  • Notes from the Field

Examining district-level performance of Ujjwala: The case of Chhattisgarh and Jharkhand

Launched in 2016, Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana (PMUY) aims to encourage the adoption of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) for cooking. Using National Sample Survey data for 2014 and 2017, this article ex...

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How many jobs were lost in urban India during lockdown?

The nationwide lockdown imposed in March 2020 to contain the spread of Covid-19, disrupted economic activity – particularly in urban India. Using data from the Periodic Labour Force Survey for the p...

  • Perspectives

Covid-19: Addressing stigma and misconceptions

Throughout the Covid-19 pandemic in India, there has been stigmatisation of patients and their families, and discriminatory attitudes towards marginalised groups as well as frontline workers. Based on...

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Energy access for marginalised communities: Evidence from rural India

While overall energy access of Indian households has improved rapidly over the past decade, access to clean fuel is still low as compared to electricity. Besides, social structures and hierarchies con...

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Covid-19: How well are government schemes supporting Bihar’s vulnerable populations?

The immediate adverse impact of the Covid-19 pandemic and associated lockdown was visibly greater for migrant workers and their households, whose ability to access government schemes in their villages...

  • Notes from the Field

DUET re-examined

In September 2020, Jean Drèze’s proposal for an urban work programme called DUET (Decentralised Urban Employment and Training) was presented on I4I. This was followed by an extensive symposium in w...

  • Perspectives

In-kind transfers as insurance

Academics and policymakers worldwide are leading the push towards unconditional cash as the preferred mode of transfer from the government to the poor. Yet surveys across countries find that large pro...

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Recent Contributors

Reetika

Reetika Khera

Indian Institute of Technology Delhi

Ali

Ali Aouad

MIT Sloan School of Management

Kamalini

Kamalini Ramdas

London Business School

Alp

Alp Sungu

Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania

Jean

Jean Drèze

Ranchi University; Delhi School of Economics

Arindam

Arindam Das

Foundation for Agrarian Studies, Bangalore

Sonalde

Sonalde Desai

University of Maryland

Maitreesh

Maitreesh Ghatak

London School of Economics

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Most Popular Poverty & Inequality Posts

Wealth inequality, class, and caste in India: 1961-2012

The level of wealth inequality in India is close to that of some highly unequal countries in the world. This article assesses the long-term evolution of wealth inequality in the country for the period...

  • Articles

Covid-19: What can be done immediately to help vulnerable population

With over 80% of India’s workforce employed in the informal sector and one-third working as casual labour, Covid-19's spread and subsequent unplanned lockdowns, have created economic havoc in the li...

  • Perspectives

EWS reservation in higher education: Affirmative action or vote bank politics?

The Constitution (103rd Amendment) Act, 2019, provides for 10% reservation for the economically weaker sections (EWS) in higher educational institutions within the general category. In this post, Devi...

  • Perspectives