Stories
Slash Boxes
Comments

SoylentNews is people

posted by mrpg on Wednesday May 30 2018, @06:36AM   Printer-friendly
from the and-fixed-with-what? dept.

Inequality in India can be seen from outer space

Are night lights on earth captured by satellites from outer space a good way to measure inequality? Economists Praveen Chakravarty and Vivek Dehejia certainly believe so. They acquired images grabbed by satellites from the US Air Force Defence Meteorological Satellite Programme. These satellites circle the earth 14 times a day and record lights from the earth's surface at night with sensors. They superimposed a map depicting India's districts on their images, allowing them to develop a unique data set of luminosity values, by district and over time.

Using data generated by the night lights, they studied of 387 of 640 districts in 12 states. These districts account for 85% of India's population and 80% of its GDP. Some 87% of parliamentary seats are in these districts. Using the novel methodology, the economists documented income divergence in India.

[...] Some 380 districts in 12 states were on average just a fifth as bright as the big cities of Mumbai and Bangalore. Also, 90% of all the districts are just a third as bright in the night as the top 10% of all districts. And the ratio has worsened between 1992 - a year after India embraced economic reforms - and 2013.


Original Submission

 
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.
Display Options Threshold/Breakthrough Mark All as Read Mark All as Unread
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
  • (Score: 2, Interesting) by khallow on Wednesday May 30 2018, @09:31AM (6 children)

    by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday May 30 2018, @09:31AM (#686191) Journal
    During this period, there has been a substantial spread of night lighting [sciencephoto.com] (image shows night light as blue, green, red, and white depending on what years it appeared on the image). So poverty has been lessening over the entirety of India as expected. While inequality has some merit to consider, it's weird that they're ignoring the more important economic characteristic of absolute levels of wealth.

    I imagine some of the causes of inequality between states is much as it is in the US, bad/corrupt governance in the weaker states, and obstacles to moving from bad states to better states (such as high real estate costs in destination regions, abusive occupational/professional licensing, and high levels of state government employment).
    Starting Score:    1  point
    Moderation   +1  
       Interesting=1, Total=1
    Extra 'Interesting' Modifier   0  

    Total Score:   2  
  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 30 2018, @01:29PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 30 2018, @01:29PM (#686245)

    The left hates progress, there must always be a victim and oppressor class or their arguments are just too easy to debunk [moneycontrol.com]

  • (Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Wednesday May 30 2018, @05:19PM (1 child)

    by DeathMonkey (1380) on Wednesday May 30 2018, @05:19PM (#686358) Journal

    You mean a study meant to quantify inequality is quantifying inequality and not something else completely? Shocking!

    • (Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday May 31 2018, @12:41PM

      by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Thursday May 31 2018, @12:41PM (#686696) Journal
      That is typical of propaganda. It focuses on the parameters that it wishes to sell.
  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 30 2018, @07:15PM (2 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 30 2018, @07:15PM (#686418)

    Equality is more important than poverty reduction.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 30 2018, @08:16PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 30 2018, @08:16PM (#686454)

      Equality is more important than poverty reduction

      Give up your personal wealth and go be equal with a homeless person then.

    • (Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday May 31 2018, @12:42PM

      by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Thursday May 31 2018, @12:42PM (#686699) Journal

      Equality is more important than poverty reduction.

      Equality means little while poverty reduction means less suffering, lower fertility rates (and hence, less problems from overpopulation the key driver to many global-scale ills of humanity), and more resources for doing stuff that we value. You can only claim the above by ignoring some really big things.