<p>After announcing the next-generation Snapdragon 845 SoC at the Snapdragon Tech Summit 2017 in Maui, Hawaii, Qualcomm&nbsp;has today detailed the features of the new mobile platform. The new chipset is based on the 10nm FinFET process with big.LITTLE architecture. Qualcomm has already mentioned that the new chipsets will be manufactured by Samsung Foundry. Here are the changes that the new chipset brings over last year&rsquo;s Snapdragon 835 SoC.</p>

<p><strong>Kryo 385 CPU</strong></p>

<p>The key enhancements over Snapdragon 835 comes in the form of better battery life and faster performance. The chipset is manufactured using Samsung&rsquo;s second-gen 10nm LPP FinFET process. The Kryo CPU architecture includes four performance cores (Cortex A75) clocked up to 2.8GHz with up to 30 percent performance improvement over Snapdragon 835. These performance cores are paired with four efficiency cores (Cortex A55) clocked at 1.8GHz, which Qualcomm says is 30 percent more energy efficient compared to its predecessor.</p>

<p>The Snapdragon 845 SoC comes with Quick Charge 4 support, which Qualcomm claims can take the battery from empty to 50 percent in 15 minutes. Also, on full charge, the chipmaker says that smartphones powered by Snapdragon 845 SoC can offer around four hours of Ultra HD 4K video playback, up to three hours of immersive unwired VR usage, and talk time of up to two days on VoLTE.</p>

<p><strong>Adreno 630 GPU</strong></p>

<p>The Snapdragon 845 SoC is paired with the Adreno 630 GPU, which Qualcomm says is faster and more efficient in processing. The new GPU is designed to offer 30 percent faster graphics, 30 percent improved energy efficiency and 2.5 times faster display throughput. It will also support 2K + 2K 120fps XR for virtual and augmented reality devices.</p>

<p><strong>X20 LTE modem</strong></p>

<p>The X20 is Qualcomm&rsquo;s second-generation Gigabit LTE modem with TrueWireless connectivity. It is designed to over 20 percent improvement over X16 modem on the Snapdragon 835 SoC. The X20 modem can offer maximum speeds of up to 1.2Gbps over 12 streams. It comes with 5 carrier aggregation with 4&times;4 MIMO technology. So, what do these specifications mean? Well, it can offer faster upload and download data speeds on upcoming 5G networks.</p>

<p>It also supports multi-Gigabit Wi-Fi with 60GHz range with ad baseband. The modem also supports Wi-Fi 802.11ac for 16 times faster connection setup and 30 percent efficiency. The X20 modem on the Snapdragon 845 SoC now supports dual-SIM 4G connectivity and Dual-VoLTE on both SIMs. It also comes with advanced Bluetooth capabilities to broadcast HD quality music or live audio to connect to multiple devices. Also, the modem is designed to consume 50 percent less power when using wireless earbuds.</p>

<p><strong>Camera</strong></p>

<p>The Snapdragon 845 SoC comes with Hexagon 685 DSP and Spectra 280 ISP (Image Signal Processing) for improved photography. The smartphone camera will also support capturing Ultra HD Premium videos at 60fps. Qualcomm has also made improvements to the ISP to correct the color gamut, color depth and luminance to make your captured photos look more lifelike.</p>

<p>It basically helps to correct the color volume, dynamic range and improve the banding. The new chipset will also support slow-motion video capture at 720p in HDR10 format, with a frame rate of 480fps. The chipset will also consume 30 percent less power when recording videos.</p>

<p>Most smartphones today come with dual-camera setups and they allow capturing photos with DSLR-like bokeh effects. The new Snapdragon chipset comes with &lsquo;Computer Vision&rsquo; for depth mapping and to add the depth-of-field effects even when using a single camera. It also supports Face scanning for biometric authentication and security.</p>

<p><strong>Artificial Intelligence</strong></p>

<p>Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning (ML) is everywhere today, right from finance to healthcare, entertainment, insurance, and transportation. The Snapdragon 845 SoC is the third generation mobile AI platform from Qualcomm. With the new chipset, Qualcomm is moving intelligence from cloud to edge to improve low latency, privacy and reliability.</p>

<p>With AI integration, Qualcomm wants to offer richer and more personalized experiences. It works with multiple platforms, such as Android, Linux and Windows, and Qualcomm is working with a number of partners such as Facebook, Google, Amazon Alexa, Baidu, and more for improved experiences.</p>

<p>AI on Snapdragon 845 comes with features such as speech recognition, object detection, face recognition, single camera bokeh effects to your camera photos, landmark detection, malware detection and more.</p>

<p><strong>Security</strong></p>

<p>The security architecture on the Snapdragon 845 SoC comes with a secure vault. It is hardware based and comes with its own Secure Processing Unit to keep your photos, videos, content and other details safe and secure. We have moved from typing passwords to fingerprint scanning, iris scanning and face scanning biometric authentication systems. And because biometrics is important to us from a privacy viewpoint, the data is encrypted and validated in the secure processing unit, thus keeping it secure. Also, with mobile payments becoming increasingly mainstream, the integration of secure vault in the chipset will enable higher level of security of your biometrics.</p>

<p><em>Disclaimer: The correspondent Ritesh Bendre is in Maui, Hawaii on Qualcomm&rsquo;s invite. Qualcomm paid for his travel and accommodation in Hawaii. The article was originally published in BGR.in, <a href="http://www.bgr.in/features/qualcomm-snapdragon-845-soc-with-kryo-385-cpu-x20-lte-modem-ai-capabilities-launched/">click here</a> to read it.</em></p>


Gujarat tops the list with more than three-fourths of its working population in the informal sector being blatantly vulnerable

After announcing the next-generation Snapdragon 845 SoC at the Snapdragon Tech Summit 2017 in Maui, Hawaii, Qualcomm has today detailed the features of the new mobile platform. The new chipset is based on the 10nm FinFET process with big.LITTLE architecture. Qualcomm has already mentioned that the new chipsets will be manufactured by Samsung Foundry. Here are the changes that the new chipset brings over last year’s Snapdragon 835 SoC. Kryo 385 CPU The key enhancements over Snapdragon 835 comes in the form of better battery life and faster performance. The chipset is manufactured using Samsung’s second-gen 10nm LPP FinFET process. The Kryo CPU architecture includes four performance cores (Cortex A75) clocked up to 2.8GHz with up to 30 percent performance improvement over Snapdragon 835. These performance cores are paired with four efficiency cores (Cortex A55) clocked at 1.8GHz, which Qualcomm says is 30 percent more energy efficient compared to its predecessor. The Snapdragon 845 SoC comes with Quick Charge 4 support, which Qualcomm claims can take the battery from empty to 50 percent in 15 minutes. Also, on full charge, the chipmaker says that smartphones powered by Snapdragon 845 SoC can offer around four hours of Ultra HD 4K video playback, up to three hours of immersive unwired VR usage, and talk time of up to two days on VoLTE. Adreno 630 GPU The Snapdragon 845 SoC is paired with the Adreno 630 GPU, which Qualcomm says is faster and more efficient in processing. The new GPU is designed to offer 30 percent faster graphics, 30 percent improved energy efficiency and 2.5 times faster display throughput. It will also support 2K + 2K 120fps XR for virtual and augmented reality devices. X20 LTE modem The X20 is Qualcomm’s second-generation Gigabit LTE modem with TrueWireless connectivity. It is designed to over 20 percent improvement over X16 modem on the Snapdragon 835 SoC. The X20 modem can offer maximum speeds of up to 1.2Gbps over 12 streams. It comes with 5 carrier aggregation with 4×4 MIMO technology. So, what do these specifications mean? Well, it can offer faster upload and download data speeds on upcoming 5G networks. It also supports multi-Gigabit Wi-Fi with 60GHz range with ad baseband. The modem also supports Wi-Fi 802.11ac for 16 times faster connection setup and 30 percent efficiency. The X20 modem on the Snapdragon 845 SoC now supports dual-SIM 4G connectivity and Dual-VoLTE on both SIMs. It also comes with advanced Bluetooth capabilities to broadcast HD quality music or live audio to connect to multiple devices. Also, the modem is designed to consume 50 percent less power when using wireless earbuds. Camera The Snapdragon 845 SoC comes with Hexagon 685 DSP and Spectra 280 ISP (Image Signal Processing) for improved photography. The smartphone camera will also support capturing Ultra HD Premium videos at 60fps. Qualcomm has also made improvements to the ISP to correct the color gamut, color depth and luminance to make your captured photos look more lifelike. It basically helps to correct the color volume, dynamic range and improve the banding. The new chipset will also support slow-motion video capture at 720p in HDR10 format, with a frame rate of 480fps. The chipset will also consume 30 percent less power when recording videos. Most smartphones today come with dual-camera setups and they allow capturing photos with DSLR-like bokeh effects. The new Snapdragon chipset comes with ‘Computer Vision’ for depth mapping and to add the depth-of-field effects even when using a single camera. It also supports Face scanning for biometric authentication and security. Artificial Intelligence Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning (ML) is everywhere today, right from finance to healthcare, entertainment, insurance, and transportation. The Snapdragon 845 SoC is the third generation mobile AI platform from Qualcomm. With the new chipset, Qualcomm is moving intelligence from cloud to edge to improve low latency, privacy and reliability. With AI integration, Qualcomm wants to offer richer and more personalized experiences. It works with multiple platforms, such as Android, Linux and Windows, and Qualcomm is working with a number of partners such as Facebook, Google, Amazon Alexa, Baidu, and more for improved experiences. AI on Snapdragon 845 comes with features such as speech recognition, object detection, face recognition, single camera bokeh effects to your camera photos, landmark detection, malware detection and more. Security The security architecture on the Snapdragon 845 SoC comes with a secure vault. It is hardware based and comes with its own Secure Processing Unit to keep your photos, videos, content and other details safe and secure. We have moved from typing passwords to fingerprint scanning, iris scanning and face scanning biometric authentication systems. And because biometrics is important to us from a privacy viewpoint, the data is encrypted and validated in the secure processing unit, thus keeping it secure. Also, with mobile payments becoming increasingly mainstream, the integration of secure vault in the chipset will enable higher level of security of your biometrics. Disclaimer: The correspondent Ritesh Bendre is in Maui, Hawaii on Qualcomm’s invite. Qualcomm paid for his travel and accommodation in Hawaii. The article was originally published in BGR.in, click here to read it.

Opinion: Gujarat is prosperous, but where is the job security

<p>Last month the National Sample Survey Organization (NSSO), India&rsquo;s pre-eminent public data collection agency released a report right in time for some Independence Day deliberations. But it hardly got any press coverage anywhere, despite the fact that it deals with the condition of nearly 70 per cent&nbsp;of India&rsquo;s non-agricultural workforce. This is a report based on a survey of nearly three lakh enterprises all over the country in the informal manufacturing and service sectors.&nbsp;</p>

<p>The unorganised or informal sector refers to those millions of tiny businesses that employ a handful of workers each, or in many cases do not employ any hired workers at all, but operate only with family labour. Seventy years after Independence, the Indian economy remains dominated, in numerical terms by the informal sector.</p>

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<h5>111 million is a large number, nearly 70 per cent of the nonagricultural labour force of India.</h5>
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<p>The NSSO report estimates the number of such enterprises in manufacturing and services (that is, excluding agriculture and construction) at 6.34 crore. The estimated size of the workforce employed in this sector is 11.1 crore or 111 million. It is important to emphasise that these are the estimates based on the sample survey. As is well-known, small informal businesses are hard to investigate. So, despite the best efforts of the NSSO (and it is widely known to be one of the best at the job it does) in reality the numbers may be much higher. In any case, 111 million is a large number, nearly 70 per cent of the nonagricultural labour force of India. And it has increased from 108 million in 2010 (the previous survey round). Of the 111 million, 36 million are in manufacturing, 39 in trade and 36.5 in other services.&nbsp;</p>

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<h5>The majority of the non-agricultural workforce in India reports being self-employed and this fact has not changed for decades.</h5>
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<p>Interestingly, of the over 6 crore enterprises in this sector, 84 per cent do not report employing any hired workers and this proportion has remained more or less constant over the past 30 years. Such firms account for 62 per cent of all workers in this sector. In other words, the majority of the non-agricultural workforce in India reports being self-employed and this fact has not changed for decades.</p>

<p>In this backdrop, let us consider the statement made by BJP President Amit Shah earlier this year, that the government would not be able to provide jobs to everyone who needs or wants one, but would rather encourage self-employment. Self-employment is, in fact, already the default option for anyone who cannot secure a job. So this statement does not amount to saying much.</p>

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<h5>In the informal sector, a family of even three members (say a husband-wife team with a child) that works together running a shop, a restaurant, a workshop, etc. earns only INR 8000 per month even today.</h5>
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<p>The most important part of the report is the data on earnings in the informal sector. If we look at the enterprises that work only with family labour, the report shows that the earnings of such enterprises (measured as Gross Value Added or receipts minus non-wage expenditures) are on average INR 95,753 per year or roughly INR 8000 per month. The good news is that this number has increased substantially, at least in nominal terms, since 2010, when it was INR 57,883. But the absolute value is still low. What it means is that in the informal sector, a family of even three members (say a husband-wife team with a child) that works together running a shop, a restaurant, a workshop, etc. earns only INR 8000 per month even today. What about hired workers in this sector? The report estimates their earnings to be INR 87544 per year or around 7300 per month. Very similar to self-employed workers.</p>

<p>What is the reason for such low earnings? A typical answer is because these workers are not very skilled and the businesses are not very productive. In fact, there is no shortage of skills in the informal sector. What they lack is formal certification of their skills, because most workers are informally trained. And as for productivity, the situation is similar to that of farmers who often fail to capture the value of what they produce because of their vulnerable position in a supply chain dominated by more powerful actors such as fertilizer and seed companies, and big retailers. In the informal manufacturing and service sector too, intense competition and a weak position in the supply chain result in informal businesses failing to capture most of the value they produce. Thus, appearing to be of low productivity and earning a pittance.</p>

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<h5>This very large section of our workforce does not earn enough to be in the income tax net either from the wage or the business income end.</h5>
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<p>Needless to say, this very large section of our workforce does not earn enough to be in the income tax net either from the wage or the business income end. Further, many transactions still occur in cash. There are many reasons for this, two important ones being that banking is expensive for low amounts of money and that these workers are not treated with respect in banks.&nbsp;</p>

<p>The Modi government&rsquo;s response to the persistent informal and cash-based nature of the economy has been to force formality by measures such as demonetisation and the Goods and Services Tax. These are meant to ensure that such economic activity also becomes visible to the government and can be monitored and taxed.&nbsp;</p>

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<h5>On the heels of demonetisation came the confusion and shock of GST.</h5>
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<p>Unfortunately, the NSSO survey cannot help us understand the effect of demonetisation on this sector because it was conducted from July 2015 to June 2016. But, it is telling that to date no comprehensive survey has been carried out by the government to assess the extent of the damage to the informal economy due to demonetisation. I know from my own conversations with the handloom and power loom weavers in Banaras that business was at a standstill for several weeks in November and December. And its effects are still being felt because losses forced many weavers to sell assets, including machines, to survive. On the heels of demonetisation came the confusion and shock of GST.&nbsp;</p>

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<h5>The most important one is to give the informal sector the infrastructure it needs to flourish, building functional cooperatives that improve the bargaining power of small producers, ensuring effective government support at least equal to what big businesses receive, and so on.</h5>
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<p>In fact, the Modi approach is misguided on several levels. First, these measures are authoritarian, nonfederal, and undemocratic. Second, the economics behind them is unsound. Third, there are many better ways to ensure that the government tax base widens and transactions become formal. The most important one is to give the informal sector the infrastructure it needs to flourish, building functional cooperatives that improve the bargaining power of small producers, ensuring effective government support at least equal to what big businesses receive, and so on.</p>

<p>But let us step back for a bit. This August 15th marks the 70th anniversary of India&rsquo;s independence. That is seven decades of policy-making with the aim of creating a modern Indian economy. The early development planners and economists in the 1950s spoke of the elimination of the small-scale economy that later came to be called the informal sector. Textbooks commonly referred to it as a transient phenomenon, soon to be replaced with large, modern firms. What happened? How come, even after decades of both planning and market-led growth, the better part of our workforce is still self-employed in tiny businesses and earns half of what a peon in a government office earns?</p>

<p>Plainly, the policies that were followed, both during the planning and the post-reform periods have not worked. But a nation-wide serious debate on both these failures has not occurred. It is in no political party&rsquo;s interest to conduct such a debate because they have no imagination other than what has been tried already.&nbsp;</p>

<p>&nbsp;</p>


Though India has barely made the shift to big industries, the informal businesses are failing to prosper because of intense competition and a weak position in the supply chain.

Last month the National Sample Survey Organization (NSSO), India’s pre-eminent public data collection agency released a report right in time for some Independence Day deliberations. But it hardly got any press coverage anywhere, despite the fact that it deals with the condition of nearly 70 per cent of India’s non-agricultural workforce. This is a report based on a survey of nearly three lakh enterprises all over the country in the informal manufacturing and service sectors. The unorganised or informal sector refers to those millions of tiny businesses that employ a handful of workers each, or in many cases do not employ any hired workers at all, but operate only with family labour. Seventy years after Independence, the Indian economy remains dominated, in numerical terms by the informal sector. 111 million is a large number, nearly 70 per cent of the nonagricultural labour force of India. × The NSSO report estimates the number of such enterprises in manufacturing and services (that is, excluding agriculture and construction) at 6.34 crore. The estimated size of the workforce employed in this sector is 11.1 crore or 111 million. It is important to emphasise that these are the estimates based on the sample survey. As is well-known, small informal businesses are hard to investigate. So, despite the best efforts of the NSSO (and it is widely known to be one of the best at the job it does) in reality the numbers may be much higher. In any case, 111 million is a large number, nearly 70 per cent of the nonagricultural labour force of India. And it has increased from 108 million in 2010 (the previous survey round). Of the 111 million, 36 million are in manufacturing, 39 in trade and 36.5 in other services. The majority of the non-agricultural workforce in India reports being self-employed and this fact has not changed for decades. × Interestingly, of the over 6 crore enterprises in this sector, 84 per cent do not report employing any hired workers and this proportion has remained more or less constant over the past 30 years. Such firms account for 62 per cent of all workers in this sector. In other words, the majority of the non-agricultural workforce in India reports being self-employed and this fact has not changed for decades. In this backdrop, let us consider the statement made by BJP President Amit Shah earlier this year, that the government would not be able to provide jobs to everyone who needs or wants one, but would rather encourage self-employment. Self-employment is, in fact, already the default option for anyone who cannot secure a job. So this statement does not amount to saying much. In the informal sector, a family of even three members (say a husband-wife team with a child) that works together running a shop, a restaurant, a workshop, etc. earns only INR 8000 per month even today. × The most important part of the report is the data on earnings in the informal sector. If we look at the enterprises that work only with family labour, the report shows that the earnings of such enterprises (measured as Gross Value Added or receipts minus non-wage expenditures) are on average INR 95,753 per year or roughly INR 8000 per month. The good news is that this number has increased substantially, at least in nominal terms, since 2010, when it was INR 57,883. But the absolute value is still low. What it means is that in the informal sector, a family of even three members (say a husband-wife team with a child) that works together running a shop, a restaurant, a workshop, etc. earns only INR 8000 per month even today. What about hired workers in this sector? The report estimates their earnings to be INR 87544 per year or around 7300 per month. Very similar to self-employed workers. What is the reason for such low earnings? A typical answer is because these workers are not very skilled and the businesses are not very productive. In fact, there is no shortage of skills in the informal sector. What they lack is formal certification of their skills, because most workers are informally trained. And as for productivity, the situation is similar to that of farmers who often fail to capture the value of what they produce because of their vulnerable position in a supply chain dominated by more powerful actors such as fertilizer and seed companies, and big retailers. In the informal manufacturing and service sector too, intense competition and a weak position in the supply chain result in informal businesses failing to capture most of the value they produce. Thus, appearing to be of low productivity and earning a pittance. This very large section of our workforce does not earn enough to be in the income tax net either from the wage or the business income end. × Needless to say, this very large section of our workforce does not earn enough to be in the income tax net either from the wage or the business income end. Further, many transactions still occur in cash. There are many reasons for this, two important ones being that banking is expensive for low amounts of money and that these workers are not treated with respect in banks. The Modi government’s response to the persistent informal and cash-based nature of the economy has been to force formality by measures such as demonetisation and the Goods and Services Tax. These are meant to ensure that such economic activity also becomes visible to the government and can be monitored and taxed. On the heels of demonetisation came the confusion and shock of GST. × Unfortunately, the NSSO survey cannot help us understand the effect of demonetisation on this sector because it was conducted from July 2015 to June 2016. But, it is telling that to date no comprehensive survey has been carried out by the government to assess the extent of the damage to the informal economy due to demonetisation. I know from my own conversations with the handloom and power loom weavers in Banaras that business was at a standstill for several weeks in November and December. And its effects are still being felt because losses forced many weavers to sell assets, including machines, to survive. On the heels of demonetisation came the confusion and shock of GST. The most important one is to give the informal sector the infrastructure it needs to flourish, building functional cooperatives that improve the bargaining power of small producers, ensuring effective government support at least equal to what big businesses receive, and so on. × In fact, the Modi approach is misguided on several levels. First, these measures are authoritarian, nonfederal, and undemocratic. Second, the economics behind them is unsound. Third, there are many better ways to ensure that the government tax base widens and transactions become formal. The most important one is to give the informal sector the infrastructure it needs to flourish, building functional cooperatives that improve the bargaining power of small producers, ensuring effective government support at least equal to what big businesses receive, and so on. But let us step back for a bit. This August 15th marks the 70th anniversary of India’s independence. That is seven decades of policy-making with the aim of creating a modern Indian economy. The early development planners and economists in the 1950s spoke of the elimination of the small-scale economy that later came to be called the informal sector. Textbooks commonly referred to it as a transient phenomenon, soon to be replaced with large, modern firms. What happened? How come, even after decades of both planning and market-led growth, the better part of our workforce is still self-employed in tiny businesses and earns half of what a peon in a government office earns? Plainly, the policies that were followed, both during the planning and the post-reform periods have not worked. But a nation-wide serious debate on both these failures has not occurred. It is in no political party’s interest to conduct such a debate because they have no imagination other than what has been tried already.

After 70 years Independence, Indian economy remains dominated by the informal sector

<p>The recent one-day general strike on the 2nd of September brought several parts of the country to a standstill. Among the demands of the trade unions was one for raising the minimum wage to Rs. 18,000 per month. The NDA government, in an attempt to ward off the strike, had announced a hike earlier in the week from Rs. 246 per day to Rs. 350 per day (Rs. 9,100 per month for 26 working days). The unions, with the exception of the RSS-affiliated Bharatiya Mazdoor Sangh, denounced the government&rsquo;s efforts and the strike went ahead as planned.&nbsp;</p>

<p>Trade unions in India have historically fought for periodic raises in minimum wages. In 2013 there was a nationwide strike (20-21 February) during which one of the demands was for a minimum wage of Rs. 10,000 per month. There was a similar strike on&nbsp;2nd September 2015&nbsp;in which a minimum wage demand for Rs. 15,000 a month&nbsp;was made. But even though the unions have been raising this issue consistently for the past several years, increases have been paltry.&nbsp;</p>

<p>Minimum wages in India are regulated under The Minimum Wages Act (1948) and there are wage floors that, in the words of the Act, &ldquo;ensure that the laws of demand and supply are not allowed to determine the wages of workmen in industries where workers are poor, vulnerable, unorganised, and without bargaining power.&rdquo; Thus, it is based on moral or ethical and not only economic principles.<br />
<br />
The method of calculation of the &ldquo;need-based&rdquo; minimum wage dates back to 1957 when the Indian Labour Congress came up with a formula that included food, clothing, and shelter requirements for a family of four. The exact amount of the wage differs based on the occupation and geographical region. The Indian states have the freedom to set higher minimums, but conceptually these wages constitute the minimum level that the central government thinks those who work for it should earn.&nbsp;</p>

<p>After periodic inflation adjustments, the minimum wage is now in the range of Rs. 9,100 to 13,600 depending on the geographical location of the worker. One may ask, whether this constitutes a living wage in India today for a family of four. Given the rapid increases in the price of housing, education, health, and food in the past few years, the answer must be in the negative. The concept of a &ldquo;living wage&rdquo; as distinct from a &ldquo;minimum wage&rdquo; has recently gained a lot of political traction in countries such as the United States.&nbsp;</p>

<p>The Committee on Fair Wages in India has defined a &ldquo;living wage&rdquo; that includes education, health, social needs, and insurance in addition to food, shelter and clothing. Studies have shown that rapid increases in expenditures on items such as education, health, fuel, and conveyance have cut into people&rsquo;s food budgets. Indeed rise in non-food expenditures has been advanced as one of the explanations for India&rsquo;s famous calorie puzzle wherein nutritional intake has been falling even as incomes are increasing in real terms. With these economic facts in mind, the claim that the official minimum wage is not a living wage and the demand for a much larger increase in the minimum wage are both justified.</p>

<p>An&nbsp;even more important issue is that, while the central and to some extent the state governments can try to enforce the minimum wages for their own employees (either direct or employed via contractors), enforcing them in the informal or unorganised sector where the vast majority of the Indian labour force earns a living is another kettle of fish.&nbsp;</p>

<p>The present increase in wages applies to unskilled non-agricultural workers in the central sphere, which means employees of the central government or workers in affiliated undertakings in occupations, such as stone breaking and crushing, mining, sweeping and cleaning, loading, unloading, construction et cetra. The National Commission for Enterprises in the Unorganised Sector (the Sengupta Commission), which became famous for observing that 77 per cent of Indians spent Rs. 20 a day or less in 2004-05, observed that even though The Minimum Wages Act covers all workers in the formal and the informal sectors, several studies have shown that the vast majority of informal sector workers are paid below the official minimum wage for their occupation.&nbsp;</p>

<p>In some instances, there exists no official minimum wage for a given occupation, so the question of compliance does not arise. Further millions of workers in the informal sector do not receive daily wages but instead, work on their own account (self-employment) or are paid in piece wages that are not easy to convert into time wages in the absence of data on usual working hours. The earnings of such home-based and other workers often fall well short of even the low official minimum wage.&nbsp;</p>

<p>In my own fieldwork in the textile industry in Varanasi, I found that weavers were routinely paid piece wages that translated into daily wages of around Rs. 100-150 per day (in 2010), far below the stipulated minimum wage for skilled silk weavers in Uttar Pradesh, which at that time was more than Rs. 200.&nbsp;</p>

<p>The situation was even worse for women workers who were paid as low as Rs. 25 to 30 per day for embroidery work. A 2010 study by the All India Democratic Women&rsquo;s Association (AIDWA) in the Delhi-NCR region found that even after working for nearly seven hours a day home-based women workers managed to earn only Rs.32.54 per day. The daily minimum wage for unskilled workers in Delhi at the time was Rs.140. Abysmally low wages for women are often justified on grounds that they are &ldquo;supplementary earners&rdquo; or that they work in &ldquo;spare time&quot;.&nbsp;Both these are questionable, not to say sexist, assumptions.</p>

<p>How then, can we ensure that at least the basic minimum standard of living that the government stipulates should accrue to every Indian family does, in fact, accrue to them? One way to do this is to end contract work as well as the practice of allowing informal workers in formal establishments, including public sector ones. This will make wage implementation easier. This was indeed one of the demands of the general strike as well.&nbsp;</p>

<p>In the post-reform period, employment of contract workers has become a prominent feature of the way private sector firms and even public ones operate to reduce labour costs and increase flexibility. The result has been a rapid rise in contract labour and almost no increase in regular formal jobs that come with some measure of job security and other benefits.</p>

<p>But what about the vast numbers who work in the informal economy beyond informal employment in formal establishments? As mentioned above, the millions of workers in India&rsquo;s small workshops, shops, and homes who produce a large variety of goods and services from food, metalware, and textiles to mobile and auto repair earn wages far below the official minimum. Most of these businesses are tiny, employing fewer than 10 workers each. Won&rsquo;t forcing such businesses to pay higher wages, closer to the official minimum wage, result in them going out of business and destroying jobs?&nbsp;</p>

<p>This is indeed a possibility because many informal businesses do operate on very small margins. In such cases, a wage subsidy, where the government supplements private sector incomes up to a certain level, may be the way to go. We are familiar with various subsidies that the government gives to the industrial sector in the form of tax breaks, depreciation allowances, SEZs, price supports etc. However, thousands of crores of rupees worth of such subsidies have not been particularly effective in creating jobs as the subsidising capital, not surprisingly, incentivises capital-intensive production.&nbsp;</p>

<p>Instead of subsidising capital, if we seriously believe that the official minimum wage constitutes an ethical lower bound on what a worker should earn then why not subsidise labour such that informal sector wages rise to that lower bound? Such a &ldquo;wage subsidy&rdquo; has recently been suggested by the well-known economist Pranab Bardhan.&nbsp;</p>

<p>Unlike a capital subsidy, this will encourage job creation as opposed to merely economic growth. It will also have large effects in boosting spending in the economy at a time when weak demand has been an important constraint on economic growth. Further, it will end the dualism between the formal sector with its minimum and inflation-indexed wages, and the informal sector that enjoys no such protection. Moreover, it will end it by moving the informal up to the level of the formal instead of bringing the formal down by informalising it, as has been the practice thus far in the post-reform period.</p>

<p>&nbsp;</p>


The official minimum wage in India is not a living wage, particularly, for the informal sector

The recent one-day general strike on the 2nd of September brought several parts of the country to a standstill. Among the demands of the trade unions was one for raising the minimum wage to Rs. 18,000 per month. The NDA government, in an attempt to ward off the strike, had announced a hike earlier in the week from Rs. 246 per day to Rs. 350 per day (Rs. 9,100 per month for 26 working days). The unions, with the exception of the RSS-affiliated Bharatiya Mazdoor Sangh, denounced the government’s efforts and the strike went ahead as planned. Trade unions in India have historically fought for periodic raises in minimum wages. In 2013 there was a nationwide strike (20-21 February) during which one of the demands was for a minimum wage of Rs. 10,000 per month. There was a similar strike on 2nd September 2015 in which a minimum wage demand for Rs. 15,000 a month was made. But even though the unions have been raising this issue consistently for the past several years, increases have been paltry. Minimum wages in India are regulated under The Minimum Wages Act (1948) and there are wage floors that, in the words of the Act, “ensure that the laws of demand and supply are not allowed to determine the wages of workmen in industries where workers are poor, vulnerable, unorganised, and without bargaining power.” Thus, it is based on moral or ethical and not only economic principles. The method of calculation of the “need-based” minimum wage dates back to 1957 when the Indian Labour Congress came up with a formula that included food, clothing, and shelter requirements for a family of four. The exact amount of the wage differs based on the occupation and geographical region. The Indian states have the freedom to set higher minimums, but conceptually these wages constitute the minimum level that the central government thinks those who work for it should earn. After periodic inflation adjustments, the minimum wage is now in the range of Rs. 9,100 to 13,600 depending on the geographical location of the worker. One may ask, whether this constitutes a living wage in India today for a family of four. Given the rapid increases in the price of housing, education, health, and food in the past few years, the answer must be in the negative. The concept of a “living wage” as distinct from a “minimum wage” has recently gained a lot of political traction in countries such as the United States. The Committee on Fair Wages in India has defined a “living wage” that includes education, health, social needs, and insurance in addition to food, shelter and clothing. Studies have shown that rapid increases in expenditures on items such as education, health, fuel, and conveyance have cut into people’s food budgets. Indeed rise in non-food expenditures has been advanced as one of the explanations for India’s famous calorie puzzle wherein nutritional intake has been falling even as incomes are increasing in real terms. With these economic facts in mind, the claim that the official minimum wage is not a living wage and the demand for a much larger increase in the minimum wage are both justified. An even more important issue is that, while the central and to some extent the state governments can try to enforce the minimum wages for their own employees (either direct or employed via contractors), enforcing them in the informal or unorganised sector where the vast majority of the Indian labour force earns a living is another kettle of fish. The present increase in wages applies to unskilled non-agricultural workers in the central sphere, which means employees of the central government or workers in affiliated undertakings in occupations, such as stone breaking and crushing, mining, sweeping and cleaning, loading, unloading, construction et cetra. The National Commission for Enterprises in the Unorganised Sector (the Sengupta Commission), which became famous for observing that 77 per cent of Indians spent Rs. 20 a day or less in 2004-05, observed that even though The Minimum Wages Act covers all workers in the formal and the informal sectors, several studies have shown that the vast majority of informal sector workers are paid below the official minimum wage for their occupation. In some instances, there exists no official minimum wage for a given occupation, so the question of compliance does not arise. Further millions of workers in the informal sector do not receive daily wages but instead, work on their own account (self-employment) or are paid in piece wages that are not easy to convert into time wages in the absence of data on usual working hours. The earnings of such home-based and other workers often fall well short of even the low official minimum wage. In my own fieldwork in the textile industry in Varanasi, I found that weavers were routinely paid piece wages that translated into daily wages of around Rs. 100-150 per day (in 2010), far below the stipulated minimum wage for skilled silk weavers in Uttar Pradesh, which at that time was more than Rs. 200. The situation was even worse for women workers who were paid as low as Rs. 25 to 30 per day for embroidery work. A 2010 study by the All India Democratic Women’s Association (AIDWA) in the Delhi-NCR region found that even after working for nearly seven hours a day home-based women workers managed to earn only Rs.32.54 per day. The daily minimum wage for unskilled workers in Delhi at the time was Rs.140. Abysmally low wages for women are often justified on grounds that they are “supplementary earners” or that they work in “spare time". Both these are questionable, not to say sexist, assumptions. How then, can we ensure that at least the basic minimum standard of living that the government stipulates should accrue to every Indian family does, in fact, accrue to them? One way to do this is to end contract work as well as the practice of allowing informal workers in formal establishments, including public sector ones. This will make wage implementation easier. This was indeed one of the demands of the general strike as well. In the post-reform period, employment of contract workers has become a prominent feature of the way private sector firms and even public ones operate to reduce labour costs and increase flexibility. The result has been a rapid rise in contract labour and almost no increase in regular formal jobs that come with some measure of job security and other benefits. But what about the vast numbers who work in the informal economy beyond informal employment in formal establishments? As mentioned above, the millions of workers in India’s small workshops, shops, and homes who produce a large variety of goods and services from food, metalware, and textiles to mobile and auto repair earn wages far below the official minimum. Most of these businesses are tiny, employing fewer than 10 workers each. Won’t forcing such businesses to pay higher wages, closer to the official minimum wage, result in them going out of business and destroying jobs? This is indeed a possibility because many informal businesses do operate on very small margins. In such cases, a wage subsidy, where the government supplements private sector incomes up to a certain level, may be the way to go. We are familiar with various subsidies that the government gives to the industrial sector in the form of tax breaks, depreciation allowances, SEZs, price supports etc. However, thousands of crores of rupees worth of such subsidies have not been particularly effective in creating jobs as the subsidising capital, not surprisingly, incentivises capital-intensive production. Instead of subsidising capital, if we seriously believe that the official minimum wage constitutes an ethical lower bound on what a worker should earn then why not subsidise labour such that informal sector wages rise to that lower bound? Such a “wage subsidy” has recently been suggested by the well-known economist Pranab Bardhan. Unlike a capital subsidy, this will encourage job creation as opposed to merely economic growth. It will also have large effects in boosting spending in the economy at a time when weak demand has been an important constraint on economic growth. Further, it will end the dualism between the formal sector with its minimum and inflation-indexed wages, and the informal sector that enjoys no such protection. Moreover, it will end it by moving the informal up to the level of the formal instead of bringing the formal down by informalising it, as has been the practice thus far in the post-reform period.

Minimum wage: wage subsidy is the solution to income disparity

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