Subscribe to Grand Tamasha on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Overcast, or your favorite podcast app. I spoke with Atanu Chatterjee, a PhD candidate in geography at the Jawaharlal Nehru University, and a lecturer at the School of Human Settlements, XIM University Bhubaneswar. We discussed his dissertation examining the in situ slum rehabilitation scheme t…

Larry Summers is a former US Treasury Secretary (1999-2001), Chief Economist at the World Bank (1991-1993), and Director of the National Economic Council under President Obama (2009-2010). He also served as President of Harvard University (2001-2006). Currently, he is the Charles W. Eliot University Professor at Harvard University, and he sits on t…

Subscribe to Grand Tamasha on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Overcast, or your favorite podcast app. I spoke with Steven Brownstone, a PhD candidate in economics at the University of California, San Diego. His research focus is on the fields of development economics, agricultural economics, and political economy. We discussed his job market paper, Labor …

In this conversation, journalist Puja Mehra speaks to former secretary with the Ministry of Agriculture Siraj Hussain about the rapid growth of India's poultry sector and how it has outpaced other agricultural sectors like fisheries and livestock. They discuss the rise of the integrator model in poultry farming, the challenges and benefits of contr…

Subscribe to Grand Tamasha on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Overcast, or your favorite podcast app. I spoke with Deepika Padmanabhan, who's a PhD candidate in political science at Yale University. Her research focuses on nationalism, language and self-determination with a regional focus in South Asia. We discussed her job market paper, everyday impositi…

Subscribe to Grand Tamasha on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Overcast, or your favorite podcast app. This is the 2024 job market series where I speak with young scholars entering the academic job market about the latest research in India. I spoke with Sukrit Puri, who is a PhD candidate in political science at MIT and an Elinor Ostrom fellow at the Merca…

In this episode, Raghavan Srinivasan, journalist and former editor for The Hindu Business Line, talks about the story of Coca-Cola's entry into the Indian market. He highlights how global brands like Coca-Cola and Pepsi, after initially trying to dominate the Indian market, had to adapt to local preferences, even reintroducing beloved brands like T…

Subscribe to Grand Tamasha on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Overcast, or your favorite podcast app. We are kicking off the 2024 job market series, where I speak with young scholars entering the academic job market about their latest research on India. Our first scholar in the series is Rolly Kapoor, who is a PhD candidate at the Department of Economics …

Nassim Taleb is trader, researcher and essayist. He is the author of the Incerto, a multi-volume philosophical and practical meditation on uncertainty. Full transcript available at: https://josephnoelwalker.com/nassim-taleb-158/ See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.Af Joe Walker

Today my guest is Ruchir Sharma, who is the Chairman of Rockefeller International, a columnist with the Financial Times, and the author of the recent book, What Went Wrong with Capitalism. We talked about American debt levels, US monetary policy, regulation and cronyism, industrial policy, the Indian economy under Modi, and much more. Recorded July…

In this episode, Puja Mehra talks to economist Ila Patnaik about the complex challenges India faces as it strives to compete with China's export dominance. They talk about the uncompetitive infrastructure, higher labor and energy costs, and irrational tariff structures that hinder India’s manufacturing sector. Patnaik discusses the impact of China'…

Today my guest is Amol Agrawal, who is the author of History of Private Banking in South Canara District (1906-69). He teaches economics at Ahmedabad University and blogs at the excellent blog Mostly Economics. We spoke about the colonial and post-colonial history of banking in India, the unique features of the South Canara district, and its banker…

In this episode, Matt sits down with Shruti Rajagopalan (Mercatus Center) to talk about what the future holds for India. We often have a tendency to think of the current economic and geopolitical situation as simply the way things are. Especially for people who grew up in the United States over the past 50 years, the fact that it is an economic and…

In this episode, Puja Mehra talks to economist Payal Malik about the impact of big tech companies like Google and Meta on market competition in India and the recent antitrust ruling against google. They explore how these giants dominate industries through data extraction, stifling innovation and harming suppliers, the need for new regulations to ad…

Today my guests are Amartya Lahiri and Devashish Mitra who are joining me to discuss their latest paper for the 1991 project titled India’s Development Policy Challenge. Amartya Lahiri is the Royal Bank Research Professor in the Vancouver School of Economics at the University of British Columbia (UBC). Devashish Mitra the Gerald B. and Daphna Crame…

Robert Boyd and Peter Richerson are anthropologists based in America. Their partnership was central to the development of Dual-Inheritance Theory, a framework that applies Darwinian evolution to culture and explains how genes and culture have intertwined to shape our species. This is their first ever joint interview. Full transcript available at: j…

In this conversation, Puja Mehra talks to Dr. Shruti Rajagopalan about the historical context of the 1991 Economic Liberalisation of India. She illustrates how the economy in india worked through the manufacture of a bicycle and goes on to explain the impact of those economic reforms, the careful planning that went into it, the people who brought i…

Today my guest is Anirudh Burman. He is an associate research director and fellow at Carnegie Endowment India, and prior to that, he worked at the National Institute of Public Finance and Policy and the Centre for Policy Research, both in New Delhi. He has his master’s in law from Harvard Law School. We spoke about the dysfunctional land markets an…

In this conversation, Puja Mehra talks to Vijay Singh Chauhan about the complexities of government budgeting and fiscal management in India. They discuss discrepancies in GDP numbers, government borrowing, the fiscal deficit, the importance of transparency, statistical skills, and public input in the budget-making process, and much more. For more o…

Today my guests are Shreyas Narla and Kadambari Shah, who are my colleagues at the Mercatus Center and research scholars working with me on the 1991 Project. We spoke about the kinds of policy change we would like to see in the coalition government led by Modi’s in his third term. We talked about the research Shreyas, Kadambari and I have been work…

Today my guest is Sajith Pai, who is a partner at Blume Ventures and he is a long-time media executive turned VC. At Blume, Sajith supports investments in media, ed tech and e-commerce, while simultaneously helping Blume building a research and knowledge platform. We spoke about the 2024 Indus Valley Annual Report. written by Sajith and his co-auth…

In this conversation, Puja Mehra and economist Amol Agrawal discuss the history and evolution of banking in India, the establishment of princely state banks, their merger into the State Bank of India, the emergence of new banking forms and much more. ABOUT AMOL AGRAWAL Amol Agrawal is a teacher of economics having taught economics at Ahmedabad Univ…

Today my guest is Anne O Krueger. She is a Senior Fellow at the School of Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University, and the Herald L. and Caroline Ritch Emeritus Professor of Sciences and Humanities in the Economics Department at Stanford University. She served World Bank’s Chief Economist from 1982 to 1986, and the first deputy man…

In this conversation, journalist Puja Mehra speaks to economist Nikhil Gupta about the financial situation of households (including weakening income growth, growing debt, and reliance on non-mortgage personal loans), the intricate relationship between the household and corporate sectors, recent trends in savings, investments, and borrowings, and mu…

In this conversation, journalist Puja Mehra speaks to economist Amol Agrawal about the history of private banks in India, how the RBI was setup, banking regulation through the years, the beginnings of some of India's most iconic private banks and much more. ABOUT AMOL AGRAWAL Amol Agrawal is a teacher of economics having taught economics at Ahmedab…

Today my guest is Karthik Muralidharan. He is the Tata Chancellor's Professor of Economics at the University of California, San Diego. He is the author of the recent book Accelerating India’s Development: A State-Led Roadmap for Effective Governance.” We talked about the lacking state capacity in India, about improving the quality of public expendi…

In this conversation, journalist Puja Mehra speaks to economist Rathin Roy about India's economic growth and challenges, the country's economic transformation, the need for inclusive development, the growing disconnect between the masses and the growth process and much more. ABOUT RATHIN ROY Rathin Roy was the Director and CEO of the National Insti…

Lucy Turnbull is an urbanist, businesswoman and philanthropist. She was the first female Lord Mayor of Sydney, from 2003-4. From 2015-20, she was the inaugural Chief Commissioner of the Greater Sydney Commission, tasked with delivering strategic planning for the whole of metropolitan Sydney. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.…

In this conversation, journalist Puja Mehra speaks to former secretary with the Ministry of Agriculture Siraj Hussain about agriculture policy, managing food inflation, minimum support price, wheat procurement, nuanced policies that balance farmer interests with consumer needs and much more. ABOUT SIRAJ HUSSAIN Siraj Hussain joined the IAS in 1979 …

Today my guests are Tom Easton and Arjun Ramani from The Economist. Tom Easton is Mumbai bureau chief. He joined The Economist in 2000 at the New York bureau and was appointed the Asian business editor in 2007. Arjun Ramani is on an extended stint in Mumbai and Delhi bureaus covering the Indian economy. Before this, he was the global business and e…

In this conversation, journalist Puja Mehra speaks to economists Maitreesh Ghatak and Rishabh Kumar about poverty estimation in India, historical trends in poverty reduction, defining the poverty line, poverty in rural areas vs urban areas and much more. ABOUT MAITREESH GHATAK Maitreesh Ghatak is Professor of Economics at the London School of Econo…

Bryan Caplan is Professor of Economics at George Mason University. A bestselling author, his books include The Case Against Education, Open Borders, and Build, Baby, Build: The Science and Ethics of Housing Deregulation. Full transcript available at: josephnoelwalker.com/bryan-caplan-155 See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.…