C. P. Chandrasekhar’s Blog

Trends in social relations are both affected by and impact upon economic changes. These in turn have an important bearing on desirable patterns of spending in the care economy, as suggested by an examination of recent marital trends in Europe. Demography_Europe (Download the full text in PDF format) ( This article was originally published in the Business Line on July 17, 2017.)

The big news late in June 2017 was that the Serious Fraud Office (SFO) in the UK had charged four former senior executives of Barclays bank, including its former chief executive, John Varley, with fraud committed almost a decade earlier, during the global financial crisis of 2008. This is the first chief of an institution embroiled in the 2008 financial crisis who faces criminal (as opposed to civil) proceedings. How long the investigation will take and what the punishment will be is yet to be seen. But being the first criminal prosecution of a small number of the large group…

Has China's labour market reached a point where long years of high growth have led to demand outstripping supply, resulting in a sharp rise in wages? China_Labour (Download the full text in PDF format) (This article was originally published in the Business Line on July 4, 2017.)

The policy shifts of the reform era have not been in favor of agriculture. Trade liberalisation, deregulation and a greater role for market forces have not benefited the farmer, who is trapped in a persisting crisis. It is time for today’s policy makers to recognise their own disconnect, and learn from the evidence at hand. Agrarian_Distress (Download the full text in PDF format) (This article was originally published in the bloombergquint on June 27, 2017)

Distressed farmers are demanding loan waivers, but that should not deflect attention from what needs to be done and undone to address the roots of the agrarian crisis.Crop_Prices Crop_Prices (Download the full text in PDF format) ( This article was originally published in the Business Line on June 19, 2017.)

Even the limited and unsteady recovery of growth in the US a decade after the 2008 crisis is based on an increase in debt that renders it unsustainable. Unsustainable_US_recovery (Download the full text in PDF format) (This article was originally published in the Business Line on June 5, 2017)

A long-acknowledged feature of global development since the 1970s is that in many countries—advanced and poor—those at the bottom of the income pyramid have benefited little, if at all, from whatever growth has occurred. One empirical outcome of that tendency has been a decline in the shares of labour in national income over time. While this has been noted earlier, it has become the focus of attention recently because of evidence of a popular backlash against globalisation as reflected in the Brexit vote in the United Kingdom, the Donald Trump victory in the United States, and the rise of Far-Right…

As the US reduces its role as engine of global demand, there are no signs that other economies will be able to pick up the slack. The mercantilist approach exemplified by Germany is creating net global slowdown. Global_Demand (Download the full text in PDF format) (This article was originally published in the Business Line on May 22, 2017)

Narendra Modi government appears to have decided to privatise public sector banks (PSBs). Preparations are underway with arguments being marshalled that “there is no alternative” to privatisation. Privatisation (Download the full text in PDF format) (This article was originally published in the Economic & Political Weekly, Vol. 52, Issue No. 19, 13 May, 2017)

While policy makers, analysts and observers paint a picture of an ongoing global economic recovery, the numbers seem to drag the optimists down. Barely days after IMF Managing Director, Christine Lagarde, declared at the spring meetings of the World Banka and the IMF that, “Spring is in the air and spring is in the economy as well,” came bad news from the US. The advanced economy that was being looked to as the one that would pull the world system out of a decade long period of sluggish growth performed poorly in the first quarter of 2017, growing at an…