Columnists

Arvind Subramanian

The writer is former chief economic advisor to the government of India.

Govt should next focus on well-being of the child from womb to first five years

Wed, Jan 06, 2021

India continues to be successful in preventing child deaths, but the health and nutrition of the surviving, living child has deteriorated, somewhat worryingly.

New Welfarism of Modi govt represents distinctive approach to redistribution and inclusion

Tue, Dec 22, 2020

Traditional redistribution, which aims to deliver on intangibles like health and education, has ceded to a distinctive ‘New Welfarism’, where Centre is demonstrably providing tangible essentials to citizens

Permitting industrial houses to own banks could undermine economic growth and democracy

Fri, Nov 27, 2020

Indian capitalism has long been stigmatised because of the murky two-way relationship between the state and industrial capital. If the line between industrial and financial capital is erased, this stigma will only become worse.

To embrace atmanirbharta is to choose to condemn Indian economy to mediocrity

Thu, Oct 15, 2020

India does not have the luxury of abandoning export orientation, the alternatives are limited. Resisting the misleading allure of the domestic market, India should zealously boost export performance and deploy all means to achieve that.

India’s export opportunities could be significant even in a post-COVID world

Wed, Oct 14, 2020

Arvind Subramanian, Shoumitro Chatterjee write: Our growth model has been export-led and should not be abandoned. Export opportunities in general and in specific sectors could be significant even in a post-COVID world.

If GST and IBC could be rehabilitated, it would help the economy. And also be a fitting tribute to Jaitley

Mon, Aug 24, 2020

India has faced more challenges than anyone imagined to its health, institutions, federal relations, and national security; and, as a result, we have missed Jaitley’s presence even more than we feared.

Plotting the economic revival: Exceptional situation calls for creative solutions

Mon, May 11, 2020

Exceptional situation calls for creative solutions — new set of procedures that utilise much of existing IBC framework, reformed IBC, bad banks for stressed assets in power and real estate sectors.

With Covid-19 crisis dealing sharp blow to struggling financial sector, revival calls for new approach

Sat, May 09, 2020

Aravind Subramanian writes: Now, following the Covid-19 shock, red ink will be blotting balance sheets across the economy.

How coronavirus crisis can be converted to opportunity to fundamentally strengthen Indian economy

Fri, Apr 03, 2020

A common thread to many of these actions — indeed prerequisites for their success — is cooperation between the Centre and states.

To subject youth to violence only adds to their sense of hopelessness about the future

Sat, Jan 11, 2020

It is bad enough that our higher education system has routinely been failing our youth. It is bad enough too that their prospects of getting decent, well-paying jobs are becoming more grim. To heap violence and physical and psychological insecurity only adds more hopelessness to their educational years

A solution: Two bad banks for the Four Balance Sheet problem

Fri, Dec 20, 2019

Indicators of exports, imports, and real government revenues are in negative territory, or close to it. Clearly, this is not an ordinary slowdown. It is India’s Great Slowdown.

Serious questions confront policymakers. Yet data are not reliable enough for them to be answered

Tue, Dec 10, 2019

Running an economy, especially one that is in a predicament such as India’s today, is infinitely more complicated and the data demands are hence commensurately greater. A Data Big Bang effort along the lines proposed here would make that difficult task less challenging.

India’s GDP growth: New evidence for fresh beginnings

Wed, Jun 12, 2019

Methodological changes have led to overestimating GDP growth by 2.5 percentage points per year between 2011-12 and 2016-17. Actual growth is around 4.5 per cent.

Parting reflections of a CEA

Wed, Jul 25, 2018

The Office of the Chief Economic Adviser is a unique public institution — not just another cog, albeit technocratic, in the vast machinery of the government of the day.

GST, a buoyant force

Wed, Jun 20, 2018

Aggregate revenues have done well, despite headwinds, especially for less developed, consuming states

Economic Survey 2018 — Thrust areas: Economic convergence, gender inequality, climate change

Tue, Jan 30, 2018

The Survey strives to combine rigor with readability, a challenge that increases in the same proportion as attention spans shrink (from absorbing op-eds to scrolling down tweets).

Putting electricity in GST

Thu, Dec 07, 2017

It must be brought within the ambit of the new tax regime. This will reduce costs, eliminate cross-subsidisation and restore the neutrality of incentives which is essential to good tax policy.

Why agriculture matters: An irony

Thu, Jun 08, 2017

Excerpts from Arvind Subramanian's lecture delivered at the National Academy of Agricultural Sciences on June 5.

The best GST there can be

Tue, Apr 04, 2017

In the determination of the rate structure, the guiding principle should be: What will make for a GST that will facilitate compliance, minimise inflationary pressures, be a buoyant source of revenue, command support from the public?

GST and the litmus test of land

Fri, Mar 03, 2017

The Goods and Services Tax will be truly transformational when domains like real estate are brought in its ambit.

The transcendental economist

Tue, Feb 28, 2017

The stunning theoretical contributions of Kenneth Arrow, who died last week, both built and undermined all of politics and all of market economics

Rehab for the balance sheet

Wed, Feb 08, 2017

A centralised Public Sector Asset Rehabilitation Agency (PARA) could help over-leveraged corporates and bad-loan encumbered banks.

Surveying ideas for India

Wed, Feb 01, 2017

Economic reforms are not, or not just, about overcoming vested interests; they are increasingly about shared narratives on problems and solutions. Economic Survey builds on this idea.

The arhar solution to pollution

Wed, Nov 09, 2016

It will also promote indigenous research and science, incentivise pulses production, rationalise pricing.

The case for cautious optimism

Thu, Sep 08, 2016

The sharp increase in nominal growth is welcome: It signals improvement in underlying real economic activity, holds out hope for the health of the corporate and banking sectors.