Articles by Ishan Anand

Investments in industry have slowed down considerably in the recent years, as has agricultural growth. Falling levels of capacity utilisation, building up of food stocks and the state of liquidity in the economy sufficiently prove that the problem today is the lack of demand. Rural distress, rising inequality and falling real wages are driving down demand. The government’s response to the slowdown has been woefully inadequate. The biggest impediment to policymaking is not the lack of ideas, but the blinkered vision of economics. 

An analysis of the trends in wealth ownership and its inequality in India between 1991 and 2012 using three rounds of All-India Debt and Investment Survey data reveals a greater concentration of wealth with the top 10%, particularly after 2002. A dramatic shift in the decile-wise patterns of annual growth rates of assets in favour of the top deciles, particularly the topmost, has also been witnessed. The study considers the extent of wealth inequality by sector, state, and social and religious groups as well. It is hypothesised that the rising levels of wealth inequality are deeply linked to the growth strategy being followed, by which the gains from growth have been redistributed among those who were already wealthy.