-Livemint.com Thomas Piketty’s estimates of inequality in India appear exaggerated on close scrutiny but the issue he raises is an important one Three years after writing a best-selling book on the growing problem of inequality in the Western world, the French economist Thomas Piketty has turned his attention to inequality in the developing world. In a recent research paper co-authored with Lucas Chancel of the Paris School of Economics, Piketty estimates that...

-The Times of India NEW DELHI: Inequality in India may be at its highest level since 1922, when the country's income tax law was conceived, with 22% income accruing to the top 1% income earners, a new paper released by economists Thomas Piketty and Lucas Chancel showed. "The top 1% of earners captured less than 21% of total income in the late 1930s, before dropping to 6% in early 1980s and rising...

-The Times of India Punjab, the leader of green revolution during the '70s, has become disreputable for farmers' suicides in last two decade or so. Usually, these suicides are attributed to farmers' indebtedness to banks and commission agents. However, it is to be noted that bank credit has played a pivotal role in investment into tubewells, tractors, farm mechanization, horticulture, dairy, poultry and forestry all over India, and especially in Punjab and...

-The Hindu An immediate stimulus is needed to regain the momentum to get India back to 8% growth The government’s move this past week to publish economic data for the April to June quarter of this year needs a look. The real growth of GDP, i.e. after removing the impact of inflation, was only 5.7%, much lower than expected. For the past six consecutive quarters, the growth rate has gone down steadily,...

-The Indian Express The failure of populist rural credit schemes stems primarily from poor understanding of farm indebtedness in the first place. From the 1970s, a lot of private investment in tube-well irrigation, farm mechanisation and allied agricultural activities took place with bank credit support. After the establishment of National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD) in 1982, institutional credit flows not only accelerated, but also exhibited diversification to fund livestock...