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Reshad N Ahsan
Reshad N Ahsan is a Lecturer (Assistant Professor) in Economics at the University of Melbourne. He joined the department in November 2010 after completing his Ph.D. in Economics at Syracuse University in May 2010. Reshad’s primary areas of research are international trade and development economics. His recent research has been at the interface of trade, labour and development. His past work has focused on the impact of trade liberalisation on unemployment and labour bargaining power in India as well as the impact of trade on firm productivity. His work has been published in top field journals, namely the Journal of International Economics and the Journal of Development Economics.
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Trade liberalisation and intergenerational occupational mobility in urban India
While the trade reforms of the 90s led to a rapid increase in trade in India, there are concerns regarding the likely impact of the reforms on inequality. This column shows that innovation induced by international trade led to an increase in the employment share of high-skill occupations, which in turn, allowed an increasing number of sons from underprivileged backgrounds to enter better occupations than their respective fathers.
Impact of trade reforms on labour’s share of firm revenues
The decline in labour’s share of national income in recent decades – a potential cause of rising inequality – has coincided with an increase in world trade. This column analyses the impact of trade reforms in India on labour’s share of total revenue at the firm level. It finds that the share of labour has been rising with reforms for small, labour-intensive firms.