19 February, 2025India’s poverty rate does not measure what you think it does
Like all national poverty rates, India’s poverty rate is interpreted as the share of the population that is poor in a given year. In this post, Merfeld and Morduch argue that, in practice, India’s...
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Joshua Merfeld Jonathan Morduch 
16 December, 2024
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In-kind transfers: Deadweight losses or gains?
Do in-kind transfers for social assistance lead to ‘deadweight losses’ by restricting consumer choice? This article presents findings from an experiment in Maharashtra, which involved offering low...
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Klaus Abbink Gaurav Datt Lata Gangadharan Digvijay S. Negi Bharat Ramaswami
- 16 October, 2024
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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...
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Sonalde Desai
- 15 July, 2024
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How has Covid-19 crisis affected urban poor? Findings from a phone survey - II
While several commentators have highlighted the plight of migrants due to the ongoing Covid-19 crisis, less is known about how low-income families living in urban shanty towns are faring. Afridi et al...
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Farzana Afridi Amrita Dhillon Sanchari Roy
- 11 May, 2020
- Notes from the Field
Webinar: Impact of Covid-19 on informal and migrant workers in India
The International Growth Centre (IGC), in collaboration with I4I, organised a Webinar on 'The impact of Covid-19 on informal and migrant workers in India', with Jean Drèze (Ranchi University), Farzan...
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Farzana Afridi Jean Drèze Purnima Menon Shahid Vaziralli
- 11 May, 2020
- Perspectives
How has Covid-19 crisis affected the urban poor? Findings from a phone survey - I
While several commentators have highlighted the plight of migrants due to the ongoing Covid-19 crisis, less is known about how low-income families living in urban shanty towns are faring. In this note...
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Farzana Afridi Amrita Dhillon Sanchari Roy
- 23 April, 2020
- Notes from the Field
Balancing corruption and exclusion: Incorporating Aadhaar into PDS
How should recipients of publicly provided goods and services prove their identity in order to access these benefits? This article reports findings from a large-scale experiment across 15 million bene...
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Karthik Muralidharan Paul Niehaus Sandip Sukhtankar
- 17 April, 2020
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Lockdown, life, and livelihood in the times of Corona
After around 36 hours of the lockdown to prevent the spread of Covid-19 in India, the Finance Minister announced a slew of welfare measures amounting to Rs. 1.7 trillion to support the vulnerable popu...
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Arjun Kumar Balwant Singh Mehta Simi Mehta
- 07 April, 2020
- Perspectives
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...
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Reetika Khera
- 25 March, 2020
- Perspectives
Populism: Why in rich countries and in good times
Economic anxiety and insecurity are often cited as drivers of populism, so why has populism emerged over the past few years in rich countries and in good times? This article argues that when the econo...
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Lubos Pastor Pietro Veronesi
- 26 February, 2020
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What is happening to rural welfare, poverty, and inequality in India?
An analysis of the draft National Statistical Office report that the Government has decided not to put out shows a deterioration in 2017-18 in consumption and poverty levels in rural India. The reason...
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S. Subramanian
- 10 January, 2020
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Economic mobility in India: Estimation using ‘noisy’ data
There has been a dramatic rise in inequality in India post-liberalisation. This article finds economic mobility to be markedly low, with at least seven out of 10 poor households remaining poor or at-r...
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Hao Li Daniel L. Millimet Punarjit Roychowdhury
- 18 September, 2019
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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...
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Devika Malhotra Sharma
- 11 September, 2019
- Perspectives
Household-level effects of affordable housing: Evidence from Mumbai
Programmes involving sale of subsidised houses to lower-middle class households have been spearheaded in all major Indian cities. This article studies the effects of one such programme implemented thr...
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Tanu Kumar
- 04 September, 2019
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Challenges in decentralised implementation of centrally mandated anti-poverty programmes
Even when the central government is committed to a jobs guarantee, rationing of work opportunities can arise under decentralised implementation in poor places. This article examines India’s efforts ...
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Martin Ravallion
- 09 August, 2019
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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...
- Nitin Kumar Bharti
- 28 June, 2019
- 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...
- Reetika Khera
- 25 March, 2020
- 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...
- Devika Malhotra Sharma
- 11 September, 2019
- Perspectives