This paper examines the differences in welfare, as measured by per capita expenditure (PCE), between social groups in rural India across the entire welfare distribution. The paper establishes that the disadvantage suffered by two historically disadvantaged groups – Scheduled Castes (SCs)...

This paper examines the effect of a federally-mandated public sector employment quota policy for minorities on their occupational choice. We utilize multiple logit models to estimate the effect of the policy on the choice between a high, middle, or low-skill public sector occupation during the...

An innovative program in the Indian state of Bihar was introduced that aimed to reduce the gender gap in secondary school enrollment by providing girls who continued to secondary school with a bicycle that would improve access to school. Using data from a large representative household survey, a...

The world's biggest and arguably most aggressive form of employment based affirmative action policy for minorities exists in India. This paper exploits the institutional features of Indian mandated employment quota policy to examine its effect on minorities' [scheduled castes (SCs) and scheduled...