Inequality report renews question on growth model
9 months, 2 weeks ago

Inequality report renews question on growth model

New Indian Express  

India’s income and wealth inequality has touched historic peaks, making it one of the world’s most unequal countries, according to the World Inequality Lab’s new working paper. Authored by renowned economists including Nobel laureate Thomas Piketty, the report estimates the richest citizens, or the top 1 percent, own 40.1 percent of the country’s wealth and 22.6 percent of the total income. The latest paper is an extension of Piketty’s 2014 study, which too pointed out India’s income-wealth gap was worse than during the British Raj and how India’s 1991 liberalisation helped increase the number of billionaires, which Forbes says grew from just one in 1991 to 162 in 2022. Over the past decade, several authors have objected to Piketty’s inequality numbers—not just for India, but also for countries such as the US.

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History of this topic

Budget 2025: How India's wealth shifted to the pockets of top 1%
1 day, 23 hours ago

Budget 2025: How India's wealth shifted to the pockets of top 1%

India Today  

To raise the spending power of the middle class, the Centre in the 2023-24 Budget extended full rebate up to an income of Rs 7 lakh, raising it from Rs 5 lakh under the new tax regime. While 57.7 per cent of income is in the hands of the top 10 per cent of people, 65 per cent of wealth …

‘India must impose more taxes on super-rich’: Economist Thomas Piketty as top 1% hold over 40% of nation’s wealth
4 weeks ago

‘India must impose more taxes on super-rich’: Economist Thomas Piketty as top 1% hold over 40% of nation’s wealth

Live Mint  

NEW DELHI - India should do more to tax its super-rich given its high levels of inequality, French economist and author Thomas Piketty said on Friday. "India should be active in taxing the rich," Piketty said at an event organised by Delhi-based think tank Research and Information System for Developing Countries and the Delhi School of Economics. He said India …

India ranks 3rd globally with 185 billionaires in 2024, wealth up 42%: Report
1 month ago

India ranks 3rd globally with 185 billionaires in 2024, wealth up 42%: Report

Live Mint  

India has emerged as the third-largest hub for billionaires globally, boasting 185 individuals in 2024, according to UBS’ latest Billionaire Ambitions Report. Billionaire Wealth Surges in India The collective net worth of India’s billionaires soared by 42.1% over the past year to $905.6 billion, reflecting the country’s strong economic momentum. Meanwhile, China experienced a decline, losing 93 billionaires as its …

Former IAS Anil Swarup publishes flawed analysis comparing GDP per capita with personal wealth, Sucheta Dalal amplifies the same, deletes post after backlash
1 month ago

Former IAS Anil Swarup publishes flawed analysis comparing GDP per capita with personal wealth, Sucheta Dalal amplifies the same, deletes post after backlash

Op India  

On the 3rd of December, Anil Swarup, a former IAS officer and Founder Chairman of Nexus of Good wrote a social media post that stirred criticism for its inaccurate depiction of wealth distribution in India. Wealth and income conflation, pointless wealth exclusions, sensationalised wealth inequality and fallacious wealth distribution argument: Anil Swarup’s analysis Anil Swarup’s analysis confused GDP per capita, …

India’s Economic Inequality Crisis: How Elite Development Models Failed the Nation
2 months ago

India’s Economic Inequality Crisis: How Elite Development Models Failed the Nation

The Hindu  

Published : Nov 09, 2024 19:05 IST - 30 MINS READ On June 4, 2005, the venerated business house of the Tatas signed an agreement to set up a steel plant in Bastar, Chhattisgarh. “The major beneficiaries of the government’s largesse”, the Press Trust of India reported at the time, were “big corporate entities like Reliance Industries, Essar Steel and …

Kaushik Basu: Future generations would be aghast at today’s inequality
5 months ago

Kaushik Basu: Future generations would be aghast at today’s inequality

Live Mint  

While there are many ways to measure economic inequality, key metrics consistently show that disparities are getting worse. As technological advances like artificial intelligence reduce demand for human labour, working-class households around the world could become increasingly impoverished. By enabling a few wealthy individuals to wield disproportionate influence, today’s global economy increasingly marginalizes and disenfranchises much of the world’s population, …

Is today’s India more unequal than under British rule?
8 months, 1 week ago

Is today’s India more unequal than under British rule?

Al Jazeera  

India’s top 1 percent holds more income today than it did under the British, new research shows. “So 90 percent of the population is not even making the GDP per capita of India,” Kumar said. Looking back at the BJP’s 2014 poll promises, Bharti said that “what we are actually observing 10 years later in terms of inequality is exactly …

Poverty and inequality debate resurfaces in election season
8 months, 1 week ago

Poverty and inequality debate resurfaces in election season

Hindustan Times  

As Indians heads to the poll this season, a new chapter is being written in a very old debate about poverty and inequality in India. This debate has been stirred up by the release of new data from a government- The economist Maitreesh Ghatak spoke about the resurgent debate over poverty and inequality on last week’s episode of Grand Tamasha, …

Mint Primer | Redistribution: Can it benefit India’s poor?
8 months, 1 week ago

Mint Primer | Redistribution: Can it benefit India’s poor?

Live Mint  

Theoretically, redistribution of wealth is a good way to bring down economic inequality. Bharatiya Janata Party has portrayed this idea as an attempt by the Congress Party to grab people’s wealth and redistribute it, especially to minorities. According to a study published by The World Inequality Lab, richest 1% of Indians now own as much as 40% of the country’s …

Trivialising the equality debate
8 months, 2 weeks ago

Trivialising the equality debate

Hindustan Times  

That India is among the rare exceptions in the Global South which has embraced privatisation and globalisation without a major economic crisis is a fact often not appreciated enough. Rising capital intensity in most high value sectors has made generating better paying jobs outside farms more difficult today. The BJP, which is clearly aware of the generalised economic discontent over …

Towards a less poor and more equal country
8 months, 2 weeks ago

Towards a less poor and more equal country

The Hindu  

In March, World Inequality Lab, a global research centre focused on inequality and public policies, published a working paper titled, ‘Income and Wealth Inequality in India, 1922-2023: The Rise of the Billionaire Raj’. It states that “the ‘Billionaire Raj’ headed by India’s modern bourgeoisie is now more unequal than the British Raj headed by the colonialist forces.” Inequality undermines both …

Inequality, unemployment, inflation in India are at all time high, says Parakala Prabhakar
8 months, 3 weeks ago

Inequality, unemployment, inflation in India are at all time high, says Parakala Prabhakar

The Hindu  

Inequality, unemployment among youth, inflation of various commodities and household debt are at an all-time high in the country, said political economist Parakala Prabhakar, in Chennai on April 16. Speaking at a national colloquium on the present political situation titled “The values at stake,” organised by Chennai Thinker’s Forum, Mr. Prabhakar, who is also the author of the book The …

Patralekha Chatterjee | Why isn’t rising inequality turning into a poll issue?
9 months, 1 week ago

Patralekha Chatterjee | Why isn’t rising inequality turning into a poll issue?

Deccan Chronicle  

The view from the penthouse and the pavement is staggeringly different. By 2022-23, the top one per cent income and wealth shares are at their highest historical levels; India’s top one per cent income share is among the very highest in the world, higher than even South Africa, Brazil, and the United States, notes the paper, titled “Income and Wealth …

Terms of Trade | What explains the disconnect between economic inequality and politics in India?
9 months, 1 week ago

Terms of Trade | What explains the disconnect between economic inequality and politics in India?

Hindustan Times  

The Paris-based World Inequality Lab recently published a paper which claims that economic inequality in India is the highest it has ever been since the British Raj. Even the most vocal supporters of the government or those who criticise the likes of World Inequality Lab paper authors will not argue that inequality has been eradicated like extreme poverty in India. …

Inequality rising since 2000s, top one per cent in India holds 40 per cent wealth: study
9 months, 2 weeks ago

Inequality rising since 2000s, top one per cent in India holds 40 per cent wealth: study

The Hindu  

Published : Mar 23, 2024 13:17 IST - 5 MINS READ Inequality in India has skyrocketed since the early 2000s, with the income and wealth share of the top one per cent of the population rising to 22.6 per cent and 40.1 per cent, respectively, in 2022-23, according to a working paper. The paper authored by Thomas Piketty, Lucas Chancel, …

Top 1% Indians’ income share is higher now than under British-rule: Data
9 months, 2 weeks ago

Top 1% Indians’ income share is higher now than under British-rule: Data

The Hindu  

March 23, 2024 08:28 am | Updated 05:23 pm IST In 2022, 22.6% of the national income went to the top 1% of Indians. Chart 2 | The chart shows the year-wise share of national income for the top 10%, the bottom 50% and the middle 40% of the population To start with, in the 1950s and 60s, the income …

Mint Primer | Mind the income gap: Is India becoming a plutocracy?
9 months, 2 weeks ago

Mint Primer | Mind the income gap: Is India becoming a plutocracy?

Live Mint  

Income and wealth inequality in India are at a historical peak with the share of the richest 1% higher than in countries like China and Brazil, finds a new study by the World Inequality Lab. Inequality in India declined post-independence till early-1980s, after which it began rising and skyrocketed beginning 2000s, shows the report titled ‘Income and Wealth Inequality in …

Inequality worsening in India with share of top 1% in total income at new high, says new paper co-authored by Piketty
9 months, 3 weeks ago

Inequality worsening in India with share of top 1% in total income at new high, says new paper co-authored by Piketty

Hindustan Times  

The share of the top 1% of Indians in total income and wealth is expected to have reached its highest ever level in 2022-23, according to a working paper published by the World Inequality Lab at the Paris School of Economics. The working paper by four economics researchers – Nitin Kumar Bharti, Lucas Chancel, Thomas Piketty, and Anmol Somanchi – …

A cap on capitalism: Is it time for India to debate one?
9 months, 3 weeks ago

A cap on capitalism: Is it time for India to debate one?

Live Mint  

Growing income disparity in an economy like India, with over 800 million people deemed in need of free food from the government, does not augur well for its developmental ambitions. An income cap could possibly curb excessive wealth accumulation among the ultra-rich and address extreme income disparity. Any drastic measure like the 2016 demonetization to cap income or wealth could …

What should India do to become a wealthy nation by 2047?
11 months, 2 weeks ago

What should India do to become a wealthy nation by 2047?

The Hindu  

In the first session of The Hindu Lit Fest 2024, N. Ravi, Chairman of Kasturi and Sons Limited; Jayati Ghosh, Professor of Economics at the University of Massachusetts Amherst; Montek Singh Ahluwalia, former Deputy Chairman of the Planning Commission; Sanjay Kaul, development policy analyst and former IAS officer; and T.N. Along with inclusive growth, you also need the development of …

World may have its first trillionaire in next decade. Here’s a list of probables
11 months, 3 weeks ago

World may have its first trillionaire in next decade. Here’s a list of probables

Live Mint  

The first trillionaire of the world may appear in the next decade, UK-based non-profit Oxfam International said in its published assessment of global inequalities this week, named 'Inequality Inc'. It included the names of Tesla CEO Elon Musk, LVMH owner Bernard Arnault, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, Oracle founder Larry Ellison and investor Warren Buffett. Not only this, in the ‘Inequality …

India among top countries with high income, wealth inequality: UNDP report
1 year, 2 months ago

India among top countries with high income, wealth inequality: UNDP report

Live Mint  

India has emerged among top countries with high income and wealth inequality but the share of the population living in multidimensional poverty fell from 25 to 15 per cent between 2015-16 and 2019-21, the UNDP said in a new report. Despite these successes, poverty remains persistently concentrated in states that are home to 45 per cent of the country's population …

Why are India’s poorest people being left behind?
1 year, 11 months ago

Why are India’s poorest people being left behind?

Al Jazeera  

On Tuesday, February 7 at 19:30 GMT: India’s BJP-led government says its final budget before a general election in 2024 will spur economic growth, but opposition politicians are among critics who say it fails to address ever-deepening income and wealth inequality highlighted by anti-poverty groups. But it does not include the re-introduction of a wealth tax on the rich that …

India\'s richest 1% own more than 40% of total wealth: Oxfam
1 year, 11 months ago

India\'s richest 1% own more than 40% of total wealth: Oxfam

Deccan Chronicle  

Davos: The richest one per cent in India now own more than 40 per cent of the country's total wealth, while the bottom half of the population together share just 3 per cent of wealth, a new study showed on Monday. Releasing the India supplement of its annual inequality report on the first day of the World Economic Forum Annual …

India's richest 1 per cent own more than 40 per cent of total wealth: Oxfam
1 year, 11 months ago

India's richest 1 per cent own more than 40 per cent of total wealth: Oxfam

Firstpost  

Davos: The richest one per cent in India now own more than 40 per cent of the country’s total wealth, while the bottom half of the population together share just 3 per cent of wealth, a new study showed on Monday. Releasing the India supplement of its annual inequality report on the first day of the World Economic Forum Annual …

India's richest 1% own more than 40% of total wealth: Oxfam
1 year, 11 months ago

India's richest 1% own more than 40% of total wealth: Oxfam

The Hindu  

The richest 1% in India now own more than 40% of the country's total wealth, while the bottom half of the population together share just 3% of wealth, a new study showed on Monday. Releasing the India supplement of its annual inequality report on the first day of the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting in Davos, rights group Oxfam International …

Aakar Patel | Can India do what it takes to make a big leap forward?
2 years, 4 months ago

Aakar Patel | Can India do what it takes to make a big leap forward?

Deccan Chronicle  

India has overtaken the United Kingdom to become the world’s fifth largest economy. In the 10 years till 1993, that nation grew its GDP by 15 per cent each year to reach $8,884. The World Bank’s data shows that India’s per capita income in 1960 was $82, while China’s was $89. To grow at 15 per cent per year is …

Can India break into high-income league by 2047?
2 years, 4 months ago

Can India break into high-income league by 2047?

Live Mint  

NEW DELHI : For many of us, Singapore is a developed nation. The United Nations classifies them as merely “developing", along with 123 other countries, including India, which currently has a GNI per capita of $2,170. In Adani's NDTV bid hangs a cautionary tale Centre mulls cutting tax rates in new income tax regime Why rising interest rates don't make …

The inequality challenge for India@75
2 years, 5 months ago

The inequality challenge for India@75

Live Mint  

During the period 1950-51 to 2019-20, for which evidence is available, in real terms, growth in GDP was 4.9% per annum while growth in GDP per capita was 2.9% per annum. This provides a sharp contrast with the period 1900-01 to 1946-47 during the colonial era, when national income growth was 1% per annum and per capita income growth was …

Income Inequality Declined in India During Covid-19, Nation Managed Shocks Well: SBI Report
2 years, 6 months ago

Income Inequality Declined in India During Covid-19, Nation Managed Shocks Well: SBI Report

News 18  

Inequality of Income in India has declined significantly since FY17, while inequality has also declined during the pandemic, according to the latest SBI Ecowrap research report. The decline in income inequality has been significant since FY17, the year of big bang formalisation that started with demonetisation, RERA reforms and GST reform in FY18, said the report authored by Soumya Kanti …

The relevance of a hypothesis on inequality caused by selfishness
2 years, 6 months ago

The relevance of a hypothesis on inequality caused by selfishness

Live Mint  

Samuel Johnson was emphatic: “Getting money is not all a man’s business: to cultivate kindness is a valuable part of the business of life.” As a normative observation, this is unexceptionable. Support for the selfish rich inequality hypothesis rises with the level of corruption and decreases with an individual’s rank in the country’s income distribution. The study’s final analysis shows …

Inequality worries bigger than what NFHS illustrates
2 years, 7 months ago

Inequality worries bigger than what NFHS illustrates

Hindustan Times  

The fifth round of the National Family and Health Survey, conducted between June 2019 and May 2021 was among the biggest in India. Based on its analysis of the NFHS data, HT’s data and political economy team has put together a five-part series data journalism series, which will appear over the course of this week. Socially disadvantaged classes are now …

Is inequality natural or a political-ideological creation?
2 years, 7 months ago

Is inequality natural or a political-ideological creation?

Live Mint  

An Oxfam report on income and wealth inequality recently set a cat among the pigeons. The Oxfam report shows that the bottom 50% of the Indian population’s income has come down to 13.1% of the total from 20% in 1991. Next, consider wealth: the top 10%’s wealth, which was 54% of the country’s total earlier, has ballooned to 64.6%, while …

'Questionable Methodology': Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman Criticises World Inequality Report 2022
2 years, 9 months ago

'Questionable Methodology': Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman Criticises World Inequality Report 2022

ABP News  

New Delhi: Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman labelled the World Inequality Report 'flawed' and its methods 'questionable' on Tuesday. The statements were made in reaction to the World Inequality Report 2022, which said that India is a "poor and very unequal country," ranking it in the bottom half of the list in terms of both wealth and income. At the …

World Inequality Report ‘flawed’, methodology ‘questionable’: Sitharaman
2 years, 9 months ago

World Inequality Report ‘flawed’, methodology ‘questionable’: Sitharaman

Hindustan Times  

Union finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Tuesday termed the World Inequality Report 'flawed' and called its methodology 'questionable'. The comments came in response to the World Inequality Report 2022, published by the Paris-based World Inequality Lab, which said India is a 'poor and very unequal country' and ranked it in the bottom half of the list in terms of both …

Number Theory: How rich are India’s richest – and how poor are the rest?
2 years, 9 months ago

Number Theory: How rich are India’s richest – and how poor are the rest?

Hindustan Times  

The scourge of wealth inequality is a global phenomenon. In a recently released working paper “The sky and the stratosphere: concentrated wealth in India during the lost decade”, we studied the changes in the household wealth distribution between 2012 and 2018. Official data suggests that the Gini coefficient of per adult household wealth in India fell from 0.718 in 2012 …

What should the government do to address deepening inequality?
2 years, 11 months ago

What should the government do to address deepening inequality?

Business Standard  

As the Budget season comes around, we’re again hearing a lot about India’s inequality problem. In the latest round of the ICE 360 Survey 2022, conducted by the People Research on India’s Consumer Economy, it was found that the annual income of the poorest 20% of Indian households -- which was constantly rising since 1995-- plunged 53% in the pandemic …

Number of Indian billionaires rose to 142 in 2021
2 years, 11 months ago

Number of Indian billionaires rose to 142 in 2021

New Indian Express  

NEW DELHI: The number of Indian billionaires grew from 102 to 142, while 84 per cent of households in the country suffered a decline in their income in 2021, which was also a year marked by tremendous loss of life and livelihoods, according to non profit Oxfam India's latest report published on Monday. It indicates that the collective wealth of …

The cold truth about India’s income inequality
3 years ago

The cold truth about India’s income inequality

The Hindu  

The latest edition of the World Inequality Report has confirmed that the world continues to sprint down the path of inequality. “Global multimillionaires have captured a disproportionate share of global wealth growth over the past several decades: the top 1% took 38% of all additional wealth accumulated since the mid-1990s, whereas the bottom 50% captured just 2% of it.” India’s …

What rising inequality means
3 years ago

What rising inequality means

The Hindu  

The COVID-19 pandemic has exposed the stark divide between the rich and the poor. With regard to income, the top 10% of the global population share 52% of the total income, while the bottom half survives with a mere 8.5% of it. The share of income among the top 10% has been varying across regions indicating that the global picture …

Global (and Indian) trends in inequality
3 years, 1 month ago

Global (and Indian) trends in inequality

The Hindu  

The story so far: The World Inequality Lab, a research centre at the Paris School of Economics, released the 2022 World Inequality Report on December 7, 2021. The report has found India to be one of the world’s most unequal countries, with the top 1% getting 21.7% of the national income. The report reveals that income inequality in India today …

India Among Most Unequal Nations; Top 1% Hold 22% Of National Income: Inequality Report
3 years, 1 month ago

India Among Most Unequal Nations; Top 1% Hold 22% Of National Income: Inequality Report

ABP News  

New Delhi: India is now among the most unequal countries in the world, according to the findings of the latest report titled 'World Inequality Report 2022'. Stating India's position as a ‘poor and very unequal country, with an affluent elite’, the report said the top 1 percent of the population holds more than one-fifth of the total national income in …

India among most unequal nations; top 1% of population holds 22% of national income: report
3 years, 1 month ago

India among most unequal nations; top 1% of population holds 22% of national income: report

The Hindu  

India stands out as a poor and very unequal country, with the top 1% of the population holding more than one-fifth of the total national income in 2021 and the bottom half just 13%, according to a report. The world map of inequalities reveals that national average income levels are poor predictors of inequality — among high-income countries, some are …

As millions fell into poverty during the pandemic, billionaires’ wealth soared
3 years, 1 month ago

As millions fell into poverty during the pandemic, billionaires’ wealth soared

CNN  

New York CNN Business — The coronavirus pandemic has worsened the massive financial gap between rich and poor around the world, a new report has found. Global billionaires last year enjoyed the steepest increase in their share of wealth since the World Inequality Lab began keeping records in 1995, according to the research group’s analysis released Tuesday. Here are five …

Asset ownership data a stark reminder of inequality
3 years, 3 months ago

Asset ownership data a stark reminder of inequality

New Indian Express  

A National Sample Survey report on ownership of assets has revealed that about 10% of Indians own over 50% of the total assets, with the skew greater in urban areas. This government survey falls more or less in line with reports prepared by NGOs and other agencies, which have stressed that while poverty is declining and growth opportunities have increased, …

Mohan Guruswamy | How rise in inequality distorts Indian society
4 years ago

Mohan Guruswamy | How rise in inequality distorts Indian society

Deccan Chronicle  

In 2013 the French economist Thomas Piketty released Capital in the Twenty-First Century, a magnum opus on income inequality. We are, Piketty suggested, returning to the kind of dynastic, ‘patrimonial’ capitalism that prevailed in the late 19th century.” We only need to look around us to see that most of the wealthy today are inheritors, and without doubt many of …

Explained: How a raging pandemic is widening India's wealth gap
4 years, 3 months ago

Explained: How a raging pandemic is widening India's wealth gap

India Today  

Ever since India gained Independence, the country has traversed a wave of ups and downs to finally become a global powerhouse over the last five years. In India, the wealth gap has been rising sharply during the ongoing pandemic as previous levels of income inequality were already high in the country. A January 2020 study by rights group Oxfam India …

India has to come to terms with inequality: Thomas Piketty
4 years, 7 months ago

India has to come to terms with inequality: Thomas Piketty

The Hindu  

If the catastrophic human toll of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic was the first wave to strike the world this year, its severe economic consequences – including loss of livelihoods of the poor across countries, leading to massive internal displacement and starvation in many cases – have been the second wave. Generally speaking, one of the themes of my book, Capital …

In India, inequality bigger challenge than poverty
5 years, 1 month ago

In India, inequality bigger challenge than poverty

Hindustan Times  

What if India had just 100 people? That’s how skewed wealth distribution is and, by a wide reckoning, the next big challenge for India isn’t poverty reduction, but inequality. Research points to two specific challenges: not only are the rich consolidating a disproportionate amount of wealth and income, but per capita incomes across states — which should converge, by standard …

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