A Division of Laborers: Identity and Efficiency in India

Guilhem Cassan, Daniel Keniston and Tatjana Karina Kleineberg

No 9544, Policy Research Working Paper Series from The World Bank

Abstract: Workers’ social identity affects their occupation, and therefore the structure and prosperity of the aggregate economy. The paper estimates a general equilibrium Roy model of this phenomenon in the Indian caste system, where work and identity are particularly intertwined. New data on occupation, wages, and caste’s traditional occupations and social status show that workers are over-represented in their traditional occupations and under-represented in socially higher or lower occupations. The authors consider counterfactuals removing castes’ hierarchical and occupational links. Despite more efficient human capital allocation, aggregate output gains are small—in some counterfactuals negative—due to weaker caste networks and reduced learning across generations.

Keywords: Labor Markets; Educational Sciences; Human Rights; Employment and Unemployment (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021-02-16
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-dge
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (4)

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Related works:
Working Paper: A Division of Laborers: Identity and Efficiency in India (2022)
Working Paper: A Division of Laborers: Identity and Efficiency in India (2021)
Working Paper: A Division of Laborers: Identity and Efficiency in India (2021)
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