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Productivity & Innovation

India’s data workers: The human labour making machines learn

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Night shift bans and female employment in Indian manufacturing

Between 2014 and 2017, seven Indian states amended their regulations to allow women to work night shifts in factories, with the condition that employers provide female-friendly amenities. This article...

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Exit barriers as entry barriers: Explaining India’s odd development path

Despite an abundance of low-skilled labour, India never experienced the kind of take-off in labour-intensive manufacturing seen in other countries at similar income levels. This article argues that a ...

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Planning for ‘jobs of the future’ in a changing world

Following decades of structural transformation, in the coming years, external factors including climate change, increasing automation, and global economic policies will all play a role in determining ...

  • Perspectives
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Is digitalisation a double-edged sword for workers in India's public healthcare system?

While technology is often celebrated as a solution to healthcare inefficiencies, its impact on India’s Accredited Social Health Activists (ASHAs) tells a more complex story. Drawing on qualitative r...

  • Notes from the Field

Post-Covid informal manufacturing growth: How states fared

Recently released official data show an expansion in informal manufacturing in India in the post-pandemic period. In this post, Goldar and Aggarwal conduct a cross-state analysis and highlight that Bi...

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Share of manufacturing in India’s total employment: No mean performance

Available jobs data show only a modest increase in the share of manufacturing in India’s total employment in the last 50 years. In this post, Bishwanath Goldar highlights that the outsourcing of ser...

  • Perspectives

Patent protection in India: Impact on innovation, pricing and competition

When stronger patent laws were introduced in India, there were fears that it would lead to higher prices without substantial gains in innovation. This article provides evidence that stronger patent pr...

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How can India become a manufacturing powerhouse?

India’s manufacturing sector has been stagnant over the past 20 years, in terms of contribution to national output as well as employment generation. In this article, Ejaz Ghani locates the explanati...

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Subcontracting linkages in India’s informal economy

Subcontracting relationships with larger firms are considered key to facilitating the growth of informal enterprises. Using four rounds of National Sample Survey data on Indian informal manufacturing ...

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Bringing work home: Flexible work arrangements as ‘gateway jobs’ for women

Millions of women stay out of the workforce despite having a desire for paid work, often because available opportunities are incompatible with traditional norms of household roles. Based on an experim...

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Can shared social identity minimise corporate frictions?

A separation between owners and managers of firms gives rise to various problems known as ‘agency conflicts’. This article explores whether having a shared social identity between managers and boa...

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Creating good jobs for young Indians: Insights from recent research

Young Indians – who are often more educated and have greater aspiration than their previous generations –are seeking ‘good jobs’. Yet, such jobs are not available to the majority. To mark Inte...

  • Perspectives

How do private players respond to public entry in pharmaceutical markets?

In 2012, the government of West Bengal outsourced the operation of key public pharmacies to private players – creating fair-price shops for selected generic medicines. How has the private sector res...

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A brighter future: Harnessing solar energy in a Jharkhand village

Simdega district in Jharkhand – one of NITI Aayog’s ‘Aspirational Districts’ – comprises small habitations that are not yet connected to grid-based electricity. In this note, Goswami and co-...

  • Notes from the Field

How R&D tax credits can drive price competition in Indian industries

In the last few decades, tax credits have been introduced in many developing countries to incentivise investment in research and development (R&D). Looking at the staggered introduction of R&D tax cre...

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Most Popular Productivity & Innovation Posts

The impact of robotisation on the world economy: A forward-looking review

Robots have long existed in human imagination and only recently in the real world. The baggage of past imagination often intrudes into our understanding of how real robots will affect our economic liv...

  • Explainers

Tripura’s bamboo sector: Potential and challenges

About a third of the total area of Tripura is covered by bamboo, and bamboo has emerged as a key thrust area for the state’s industrial development. Based on a field visit that was undertaken to stu...

  • Notes from the Field

An offline alternative for Aadhaar-based biometric authentication

While decision on the constitutionality of Aadhaar by the Supreme Court of India remains a matter of speculation, it has become abundantly clear that most of the use cases for Aadhaar-based biometric ...

  • Perspectives