ABSTRACT
India’s rapid economic progress over the past two decades has attracted a lot of attention from academic economists, development practitioners and policymakers. Indeed, the Indian economy has been growing at a steady pace since the 1980s (see Figure 3.1). Not surprisingly, much of the emphasis of the academic as well as the policy debates are on the causes of this turnaround. However, the vast gap between the living standards in India and in the developed world goes relatively unnoticed. Figure 3.1 illustrates that, even though there has been a steady increase in per capita GDP in India, it has had little effect on the gap between India and the United States or the United Kingdom. It also shows that the gap between countries is persistent and that there is very little change in relative positions since 1950. 1 Indian Economy in Comparative Perspective Since Independence https://s3-euw1-ap-pe-df-pch-content-public-p.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/9780203827796/f5fecf02-a75a-48d4-bbcf-9d7a2c53f231/content/3_1_B.tif" xmlns:xlink="https://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"/> Note: Real GDP per capita figures are from Heston et al. (2006: Table 6.2) and measured in PPP 2000 constant US dollars.
