IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ecq/wpaper/1117.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

The Post-Reform Narrowing of Inequality Across Castes: Evidence from the States

Author

Listed:
  • Viktoria Hnatkovska
  • Amartya Lahiri

Abstract

The past three decades have seen a sharp macroeconomic takeoff in India. How have these aggregate changes affected the economic disparity between the different social groups? We examine this issue by studying the time series evolution of the economic disparities between scheduled castes and tribes (SC/STs) and non-SC/STs during the period 1983-2005. The distinctive feature of our study is that we exploit the variation in the evolution of these indicators of disparity to determine the role played by alternative factors in accounting for the overall patterns. Broadly, we find that both aggregate growth and political empowerment of SC/STs may have played a significant role in accounting for the declining gaps between these groups during this period.

Suggested Citation

  • Viktoria Hnatkovska & Amartya Lahiri, 2011. "The Post-Reform Narrowing of Inequality Across Castes: Evidence from the States," Working Papers 1117, School of International and Public Affairs, Columbia University, revised Jan 2011.
    • Handle: RePEc:ecq:wpaper:1117
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://indianeconomy.columbia.edu/sites/default/files/working_papers/wp_2012-2.pdf
    File Function: First version, 2011
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Rohini Pande, 2003. "Can Mandated Political Representation Increase Policy Influence for Disadvantaged Minorities? Theory and Evidence from India," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 93(4), pages 1132-1151, September.
    2. Vani K. Borooah, 2005. "Caste, Inequality, and Poverty in India," Review of Development Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 9(3), pages 399-414, August.
    3. Kaivan Munshi & Mark R. Rosenzweig, 2005. "Why is Mobility in India so Low? Social Insurance, Inequality, and Growth," CID Working Papers 121, Center for International Development at Harvard University.
    4. Viktoria Hnatkovska & Amartya Lahiri & Sourabh B. Paul, 2013. "Breaking the Caste Barrier: Intergenerational Mobility in India," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 48(2), pages 435-473.
    5. Viktoria Hnatkovska & Amartya Lahiri & Sourabh Paul, 2012. "Castes and Labor Mobility," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 4(2), pages 274-307, April.
    6. Ito, Takahiro, 2009. "Caste discrimination and transaction costs in the labor market: Evidence from rural North India," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 88(2), pages 292-300, March.
    7. Kijima, Yoko, 2006. "Caste and Tribe Inequality: Evidence from India, 1983-1999," Economic Development and Cultural Change, University of Chicago Press, vol. 54(2), pages 369-404, January.
    8. Banerjee, Biswajit & Knight, J. B., 1985. "Caste discrimination in the Indian urban labour market," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 17(3), pages 277-307, April.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Viktoria Hnatkovska & Amartya Lahiri & Sourabh Paul, 2012. "Castes and Labor Mobility," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 4(2), pages 274-307, April.
    2. Chen, Hung-Ju & Sultana, Rezina, 2013. "Job Reservation and Intergenerational Transmission of Preferences," MPRA Paper 45036, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    3. Ira N. Gang & Kunal Sen & Myeong-Su Yun, 2017. "Is Caste Destiny? Occupational Diversification among Dalits in Rural India," The European Journal of Development Research, Palgrave Macmillan;European Association of Development Research and Training Institutes (EADI), vol. 29(2), pages 476-492, April.
    4. Hnatkovska, Viktoria & Hou, Chenyu & Lahiri, Amartya, 2021. "Convergence across castes," MPRA Paper 108980, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    5. Maity, Bipasha, 2017. "Comparing Health Outcomes Across Scheduled Tribes and Castes in India," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 96(C), pages 163-181.
    6. Cassan, Guilhem, 2019. "Affirmative action, education and gender: Evidence from India," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 136(C), pages 51-70.
    7. Tushar Agrawal, 2014. "Gender and caste-based wage discrimination in India: some recent evidence [Geschlecht und Kaste-ansässige Lohndiskriminierung in Indien: Einige Neue Beweise]," Journal for Labour Market Research, Springer;Institute for Employment Research/ Institut für Arbeitsmarkt- und Berufsforschung (IAB), vol. 47(4), pages 329-340, December.
    8. Mehtabul Azam, 2022. "Household income mobility in India, 1993–2011," Review of Development Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 26(4), pages 1902-1943, November.
    9. Munshi, K., 2017. "Caste and the Indian Economy," Cambridge Working Papers in Economics 1759, Faculty of Economics, University of Cambridge.
    10. Bidner, Chris & Eswaran, Mukesh, 2015. "A gender-based theory of the origin of the caste system of India," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 114(C), pages 142-158.
    11. Mehtabul Azam, 2012. "A distributional analysis of social group inequality in rural India," Journal of International Development, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 24(4), pages 415-432, May.
    12. Vegard Iversen & Adriaan Kalwij & Arjan Verschoor & Amaresh Dubey, 2014. "Caste Dominance and Economic Performance in Rural India," Economic Development and Cultural Change, University of Chicago Press, vol. 62(3), pages 423-457.
    13. Utteeyo Dasgupta & Subha Mani & Smriti Sharma & Saurabh Singhal, 2020. "Social Identity, Behavior, and Personality," Working Papers 308280016, Lancaster University Management School, Economics Department.
    14. Sugata Bag & Suman Seth & Barnali Basak, 2023. "Heterogeneous effect of the Indian affirmative action: The role of caste certificates," Working papers 339, Centre for Development Economics, Delhi School of Economics.
    15. Bharti Nandwani, 2016. "Caste and Class," Review of Market Integration, India Development Foundation, vol. 8(3), pages 135-151, December.
    16. Ito, Takahiro, 2009. "Caste discrimination and transaction costs in the labor market: Evidence from rural North India," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 88(2), pages 292-300, March.
    17. Mahadevan, Renuka & Suardi, Sandy, 2013. "Is there a role for caste and religion in food security policy? A look at rural India," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 31(C), pages 58-69.
    18. Utteeyo Dasgupta & Subha Mani & Smriti Sharma & Saurabh Singhal, 2023. "Social Identity, Behavior, and Personality: Evidence from India," Journal of Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 59(4), pages 472-489, April.
    19. Ashish Singh, 2011. "Farm income inequality and the role of caste: new evidence from India," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 31(4), pages 2847-2862.
    20. Devesh Roy & Sunil Saroj & Mamata Pradhan, 2022. "Nature of employment and outcomes for urban labor: evidence from the latest labor force surveys in India," Indian Economic Review, Springer, vol. 57(1), pages 165-221, June.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ecq:wpaper:1117. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Ursula Schwarzhaupt (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/siclbus.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.