Peer Reviewed Chapters
Markets, space and infrastructure. Chapter 1 in Public Policies and Business Strategies in India and Europe: Ideas for a Sustainable, Inclusive and Resilient Society edited by Bidisha Banerji, Sheetal Sharma. Springer Nature, 2025.
Abstract
The paper explores the relationship between markets, space and infrastructure through an interdisciplinary lens. There are two competing conceptualisations of space, i.e., the Cartesian space and the social space as conceived by Lefebvre (1974). Economics assumes that markets operate over Cartesian space. To explore the relationship between market and space, we break down market transactions into its four spatial flows, i.e., the flow of information about the price and quality of the goods and the actual flow of goods and money between buyers and sellers. We define market-space as a contiguous social space between all potential buyers and sellers through which these four spatial flows occur. Our main argument is that the pre-requisite for a well-functioning market is a market-space that has public good characteristics. Further, we use the notion of Lefebvrian social space to understand the key role transport and telecommunication infrastructure play in creating a conducive market-space that can support the markets and explore why some remote areas are not able to access certain markets.Spatial Infrastructure in the Modern Economy. 2025. Under review (revise & resubmit).
Abstract
The chapter examines the role of spatial infrastructure in modern economies, arguing that it is crucial for facilitating movement and transforming geographical space. It draws a distinction between locational infrastructure and spatial infrastructure. The former is tied to a specific location while the latter facilitates the movement of people, goods, resources, and information across space. The chapter makes the case that spatial infrastructure has a key role in providing equal opportunities to people living in various locations across the country. It also discusses the state’s role in transforming the geographical space of the country and the policy challenge of providing equitable distribution of infrastructure. It highlights a successful policy experiment in India that led to the creation of spatial infrastructure and preceded the change in India’s economic growth trajectory. The chapter contributes to the discourse on the role of infrastructure in modern economies and its potential to mitigate inequality.Papers
Have I got a job for you? Automation, Market Structure and Skills. 2019. SSRN Working Paper No. 3213532.
Abstract
The paper asks a simple question. If individuals demand products from the firms in the economy and supply their skills concomitantly to the firms, then why should there be skill gap in the society, i.e., mismatch between skills that individuals possess and firm’s demand. After all, in a decentralised economy prices of various products and skill specific wages should adjust to ensure that there is match between demand and supply of skills. The paper suggests that there are three factors that keep skill gap alive. The first two are the web of dynamic complementarities in the way human beings acquire skills and the way they invent new technologies. The third factor is the lack of competition in the product market that accompanies period of accelerated technical change. The papers looks at the impact automation and globalisation has had in opening up the skill gap and suggest policies that would help close the skill gap. With accelerated changes in technology and concomitant social changes, it is ever so more important to have a learning environment that allows workers and citizens in the society to learn and adapt flexibly.Solow-Swan growth model and the fortunes of the commons. 2018. MPRA Paper No. 87921.
Abstract
The private capital formation process is predicated on functioning markets in the Solow growth model. In developing countries, the markets are either missing, fail or do not function properly. Markets function over space that is created by certain types of critical infrastructure, ie, transport and telecommunication networks. With only one type of capital that is privately owned and reliant on markets, the Solow growth model is not able to address the problem of how to create infrastructural capital that supports markets in the economy if the markets are not working in the first place. The paper incorporates the fiscal channel in the Solow growth model to address this question. The fiscal channel transforms taxes into public infrastructure. This is distinct from the savings channel which transforms private savings into private capital. The models throws light on the complicated relationship between the fiscal and savings channels. The fiscal and saving channels compete with each other for non-consumed output and use it to create the public infrastructure and private capital, which in turn, are inputs into the economy’s aggregate production function. The paper shows that the saving and fiscal channels are complementary even when public and private capital are not complements in the aggregate production function. It is due to the complementarity that private capital accumulation is not possible without accumulating public infrastructure and vice-versa. This is a potential explanation for the low-income or poverty trap.Beyond Microcredit: Giving the Poor a Way to Save Their Way out of Poverty. 2018.
Abstract
The implicit assumption in Microfinance literature has been that offering the poor credit is the most efficient way to alleviate poverty. This paper examines the optimal design of group-lending Microfinance institutions that offers both saving and borrowing opportunities. Offering saving opportunities requires restricting credit within the group. This leads to negative assortative matching within the group along wealth lines, i.e., there is significant wealth heterogeneity within the endogenously formed groups. Further, the paper shows that under some reasonable assumptions, the Microfinance institutions that offer both borrowing and saving opportunities are able to reach poorer individuals than institutions that only offer borrowing opportunities.The decline of chartered markets in 19th century Britain. 2017. Working paper. (with Lanxi Tu and Leigh Shaw-Taylor)
Abstract
Between 1827 and 1888, the number of markets in England and Wales dropped from 774 to 421. This paper uses New Economic Geography to analyse how railways caused market decline, focusing on competition between markets and from fixed shops. Using a unique dataset from the Cambridge Population Group we use ‘market potential’ to analyse the positive effect of railways on markets. By investigating which markets declined, we analyse whether decreased transport costs increased regional inequality in 19th century Britain.Sequential Group Lending with Moral Hazard. 2014. Edinburgh School of Economics Discussion Paper Series 136.
Abstract
We examine a Microfinance institution’s ability to lend to low productivity project undertaken by wealth-less borrowers in two-task moral hazard environment where borrower exert effort on their project and to influence their peer’s effort level. We compare the mechanisms of individual, simultaneous and sequential group lending while varying the peer-influence function. We show that the sequential group lending has the smallest lower-bound on project productivity if the cost of influencing peer’s action is negligible. Conversely, simultaneous lending has the smallest lower bound if cost of influencing the peer tends to infinity.Does Subsidising the Cost of Capital Really Help the Poorest? An Analysis of Saving Opportunities in Group Lending. 2007. Edinburgh School of Economics Discussion Paper Series140.
Other writings
A Lost War and A Lost Peace. Prism, Vol 3. Issue 7, July- August 2021.
The devil in the Covid-19 detail. Prism. Vol. 2, Issue 4, April - May, 2020.