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Begin New Search Topic Inequality Political Geography India Content Type Working Paper Publication Year within 10 Years Publication Year within 5 Years

1. Women’s inheritance rights and time use: Evidence from the Hindu Succession Act in India

Author:
Tana Gupta
Publication Date:
02-2022
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
United Nations University
Abstract:
This paper examines the impact of the Hindu Succession Act on married women’s time use in India. The Hindu Succession Act was amended between 1976 and 2005 by giving equal inheritance rights to women for inheriting property. To estimate the effect of the equal inheritance reform, I devise a difference-in-difference strategy by exploiting the features of the reform. Using the nationally representative Time Use Survey 2019, I find that women exposed to the reform are investing 46 minutes per day more in employment. Moreover, women exposed to the reform are spending 44 minutes per day less time on home production, with no change in their leisure time. By looking at the individual components of home production, I find that the reduction in home production is driven on account of a decline in time spent on domestic chores, with no change in childcare work. In addition, I find that women exposed to reform devote slightly more time to learning. This implies that the reform has led women to substitute their time from home production to market work. These findings are consistent with an increase in women’s autonomy effect. I also find evidence of intra-household substitution of home production work for exposed women through sharing the burden of home production by other household members, especially the male members. This suggests that inheritance reform could be a form of reversal of the devaluing of women’s domestic and reproductive labour.
Topic:
Women, Inequality, Legislation, and Inheritance
Political Geography:
South Asia and India

2. The legal basis for affirmative action in India

Author:
Kiruba Munusamy
Publication Date:
07-2022
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
United Nations University
Abstract:
The affirmative action policy in India came into practice because of the generations of struggle undergone by the untouchable castes and other backward classes, who were historically excluded from education and administration. As society changed, it was inevitable that the vulnerable groups who had so far been forgotten in terms of social justice should be ‘included’. However, this paper finds that, instead of recognizing this need the judiciary continued to apply illogical limitations and age-old precedents that disrupted the implementation of affirmative action. Although the legal basis of affirmative action comes from the Constitution of India itself, which provides for reservation and enables States to make laws to that end, judicial interference has necessitated ongoing legislative changes to keep the needed affirmative action on track. Progress has been made, but it is often a case of ‘two steps forward, one step back’, and many issues, such as the ceiling on reservations and the categories to be included in it, remain to be resolved.
Topic:
Inequality, Social Justice, Judiciary, and Affirmative Action
Political Geography:
South Asia and India

3. Do gendered laws matter for women’s economic empowerment?

Author:
Marie Hyland, Simeon Djankov, and Pinelopi Koujianou Goldberg
Publication Date:
03-2021
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Peterson Institute for International Economics
Abstract:
reater legal equality between men and women is associated with a narrower gender gap in opportunities and outcomes, fewer female workers in positions of vulnerable employment, and greater political representation for women. While legal equality is on average associated with better outcomes for women, the experience of individual countries may differ significantly from this average trend, depending on the countries’ stage of development (as proxied by per capita GDP). Case studies from the Democratic Republic of the Congo, India, and Spain demonstrate this deviation. Especially in developing countries, legislative measures may not necessarily translate into actual empowerment, due mainly to deeply entrenched social norms, which render legal reforms ineffective. Women are more likely than men to be in vulnerable employment in low- and lower-middle-income economies but less likely than men to be in vulnerable employment in upper-middle- and high-income economies. Analysis of a 50-year panel of gendered laws in 190 countries reveals that country attributes that do not vary or change only slowly over time—such as a country’s legal origin, form of government, geographic characteristics, and dominant religion—explain a very large portion of the variation across countries. This finding suggests that the path to legal equality between men and women may be a long and arduous one. Nevertheless, the data also show that the past five decades have seen considerable progress toward legal gender equality. Gendered laws do evolve, suggesting a role for legal reforms in women’s economic empowerment.
Topic:
Gender Issues, Law, Women, Inequality, and Economy
Political Geography:
Africa, Europe, South Asia, India, Democratic Republic of the Congo, and Spain

4. Women Left Behind

Author:
Radhika Jain and Pascaline Dupas
Publication Date:
06-2021
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center
Abstract:
Using administrative data on over 4 million hospital visits, we document striking gender disparities within a government health insurance program that entitles 46 million poor individuals to free hospital care in Rajasthan, India. Females account for only 33% of hospital visits among children and 43% among the elderly. These shares are lower for more expensive types of care, and far lower than sex differences in illness prevalence can explain. Almost two-thirds of non-childbirth spending is on males. We combine these data with patient survey, census, and electoral data to show that 1) the program is unable to fully offset the costs of care-seeking, which results in disparities in hospital utilization because some households are willing to allocate more resources to male than female health; 2) lowering costs does not reduce disparities, because males benefit as much as females do; and 3) long-term exposure to village-level female leaders reduces the gender gap in utilization, but effects are modest and limited to girls and young women. In the presence of gender bias, increasing access to and subsidizing social services may increase levels of female utilization but fail to address gender inequalities without actions that specifically target females.
Topic:
Gender Issues, Governance, Health Care Policy, Women, Inequality, and Health Insurance
Political Geography:
India and Asia

5. What Matters for Urban Women’s Work?

Author:
Shamindra Nath Roy and Partha Mukhopadhyay
Publication Date:
01-2020
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Centre for Policy Research, India
Abstract:
India is one of the lowest globally in terms of female labour force participation (FLFP), ranking only better than Pakistan in South Asia. While the decline in FLFP in rural areas is starkly visible, the urban FLFP has been consistently low since the 1980s despite higher economic growth and increasing level of education among females. The economic cost of such low FLFP (16.8%) is huge and if, for instance, it could be raised to the level of FLFP in China (61.5%), it has the potential to raise India’s GDP up to 27%. This paper attempts to investigate the structural deficiencies behind this consistently low urban FLFP through a variety of perspectives, ranging from measuring the complexity of women’s work to the implications of caste, location and family structure. It finds factors like presence of female-friendly industries, provision of regular salaried jobs and policies that cater to women’s needs to work near home like availability of part-time work, can improve the situation, though prejudices arising from patriarchy require to be addressed to make these measures truly transformative and not palliative.
Topic:
Education, Gender Issues, Labor Issues, Women, Inequality, and Economy
Political Geography:
South Asia and India

6. State of Urban Poor Rental Housing in India and Emerging Policy trends

Author:
Anindita Mukherjee, Shubhagato Dasgupta, and Aparna Das
Publication Date:
04-2020
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Centre for Policy Research, India
Abstract:
“Housing for All”, an often-stated vision for housing policies in India, has come to mean ownership houses for all residents. This singular focus has been part of programs from the early 1970s and has failed to recognize the range of housing tenures that may enable a viable, sustainable market. This paper reviews the evolution of housing policies since independence and shows that the emphasis on rental housing has not been a central part of housing programs to date. It then broadly characterizes the rental housing market in India, based on national statistics, to show how rental housing for the urban poor, is half of the rental housing market and is the least understood. Thereafter based on primary survey findings, it identifies the main issues that may inform a comprehensive rental housing program was to be developed in India.
Topic:
Poverty, Inequality, Urban, and Housing
Political Geography:
South Asia and India

7. Delhi Green Deal

Author:
Rohit Azad and Shouvik Chakraborty
Publication Date:
06-2020
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Political Economy Research Institute (PERI), University of Massachusetts Amherst
Abstract:
In this paper, we propose a carbon tax policy for Delhi, the most polluted capital in the world, which will fundamentally change the energy mix of Delhi's economy toward clean, green energy and will guarantee universal access to electricity, transport and food, up to a certain amount. Any carbon mitigation strategy needs to alter our dependence on fossil fuels, requiring a systemic overhaul of its energy mix. Implementing a carbon tax will mitigate emissions and mobilise revenue for our proposed re-distributive program of Right to Food, Energy and Travel (RFET). The policy is designed to prefer `the poor over the rich' as a way of compensating for `rich hiding behind the poor' in terms of emissions and polluting the environment. Using the input-output analysis, we estimate the class-wise distribution of carbon emissions in Delhi. We find that in order to implement this programme, the necessary estimated tax would be $112.5 per metric ton of carbon dioxide. The free entitlement of fuel and electricity per household comes out to be 2040 kWh per annum and there is an annual universal travel pass of $75 per person for use in public transport, and annual per capita availability of food of $205. The purpose of this proposed policy is two-fold in the context of Delhi: bring emissions under control and provide relief to the people who are at the receiving end of this climate crisis.
Topic:
Climate Change, Energy Policy, Inequality, Carbon Tax, Carbon Emissions, and Green Deal
Political Geography:
South Asia and India

8. Labor Laws and Manufacturing Performance in India: How Priors Trump Evidence and Progress Gets Stalled

Author:
Servaas Storm
Publication Date:
02-2019
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Institute for New Economic Thinking (INET)
Abstract:
Strong labor protections for ordinary workers are often portrayed as a ‘luxury developing countries cannot afford’. No study has been more influential in propagating this perversity trope in the context of the Indian economy than the QJE article of Besley and Burgess (2004). Their article provides econometric evidence that pro-worker regulation resulted in lower output, employment, investment and productivity in India’s registered manufacturing sector. This paper reviews existing critiques of Besley and Burgess (2004), which highlight conceptual and measurement errors and uncover econometric weaknesses. The paper takes a step beyond these: it reports a failure to replicate Besley and Burgess’ findings and demonstrate the nonrobustness of their results. My deconstruction is not only about the econometrics, however. I show that Besley and Burgess’ findings are not just inconsistent with their theoretical priors, but also internally contradictory and empirically implausible, taxing any person’s capacity for belief. The paper, written by two ‘useful economists’, exhibits a gratuitous empiricism in which priors trump evidence. On all counts, it fails the test of being useful to the purpose of ‘evidence-based’ public policy advice.mp Evidence and Progress Gets Stalled
Topic:
Economics, Political Economy, Labor Issues, Inequality, and Labor Policies
Political Geography:
India and Asia

9. Inequalities in the Gendered Labour Market: What can be Done?

Author:
Santosh Mehrotra
Publication Date:
07-2019
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Centre for Sustainable Employment, Azim Premji University
Abstract:
Globally, research has shown that, there is a high correlation between the level of per capita income and the rate of female labour force participation. At the same time the agency and autonomy of women in a country improve with the level of female labour force participation. Sen (2000) has argued that the autonomy and agency of women in a society and their empowerment is enabled by four conditions in their lives. First the higher the education level of women, the more empowered they are likely to feel. Second, if they are working outside the home, they are likely to feel a sense of autonomy and empowerment. Third, they should also have an independent source of income from that of the significant other in their household. Finally, their empowerment can be usually enhanced if they own assets and have access to them. One can see from this analysis that the first three requirements for women’s’ empowerment are related to each other and to some extent co-dependent. We will keep these considerations in mind as we analyse labour markets and how women engaged with them in different parts of the world.
Topic:
Development, Economics, Education, Gender Issues, Labor Issues, Women, Employment, and Inequality
Political Geography:
India

10. Income and consumption inequality in China: A comparative approach with India

Author:
Carlos Gradín and Binbin Wu
Publication Date:
08-2019
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
United Nations University
Abstract:
We analyse income and expenditure distribution in China in a comparative perspective with India. These countries represent extreme cases in the relationship of inequality to both wellbeing indicators. Income is more highly concentrated than expenditure in India, especially at the top of the distribution. Both types of inequality are similar in China, although expenditure is more unequally distributed than income in urban areas. China has a much stronger correlation in individual ranks and levels between the two wellbeing distributions. As a result, expenditure inequality is higher in China than in India, but income inequality much lower. This results partially from differences in population composition, such as China being more urbanized and having smaller households, but mostly from differences in conditional income distributions, especially by attained education of the household head. We show that hybrid measures of wellbeing combining income and expenditure can be useful for such cross-country comparison.
Topic:
Inequality, Income Inequality, and Consumerism
Political Geography:
China, South Asia, India, and Asia