India’s Growth Leap: Insights from EAC-PM Member Shamika Ravi | Ep 21 | Growth is Good

Video Description

What really pulled 302 million Indians out of poverty? In this episode of Growth is Good, Rahul Ahluwalia sits down with Dr Shamika Ravi, Member of the Prime Minister’s Economic Advisory Council (EAC-PM), to unpack what the latest data actually says about poverty, growth, inequality and jobs in India. They talk about her journey from development economist to growth thinker, why a famous ultra-poor experiment changed her mind, and why reforms in labour laws and regulation matter so much. Chapters 00:00 – Promo 01:41 – Introduction 02:04 – 1991, college and discovering economic policy 03:11 – From “development first” to seeing the power of growth 05:31 – The ultra-poor RCT that didn’t work and what it taught 08:10 – NREGA, rising rural wages and the problem with “lab conditions” 11:21 – New poverty data: how we measure it and what’s changed 13:26 – 302 million out of poverty on the higher Rangarajan line 15:54 – Is growth inequitable? Bihar, regions and why geography matters 18:10 – Muslims, SC/ST, OBCs: what the data shows for each group 21:14 – Amenities, saturation and how basic services raise productivity 23:40 – If growth is the way, what must India fix next? 25:41 – Labour laws, minimum wages and the Mahalanobis–Nehru debate 26:56 – Why over-regulation killed jobs and pushed firms informal 27:48 – Minimum vs median wages: what fast-growing states get right 29:02 – Inequality debates, Piketty and why India isn’t the G7 29:50 – Strategic resilience: plugging into global trade without retreating 32:24 – Tariffs vs subsidies and making Indian industry competitive 35:45 – What Aatmanirbhar Bharat really means: jobs and capabilities 38:10 – Food, energy, defence and the logic of self-reliance 40:19 – Deregulation and size of the state 42:17 – Can India grow at 8–8.5%? Closing thoughts & hopes 🎧 Audio version available on Spotify: 📩 For more research, data stories and episodes, subscribe to the FED newsletter: https://mailchi.mp/fedev.org/creating-100000-jobs-andhras-export-roadmap-and-indias-next-growth-wave-fed-october-newsletter