Person:
Nayyar, Gaurav
Author Name Variants
Fields of Specialization
Economic growth,
Structural transformation,
India,
Development Economics,
International Economics
Degrees
ORCID
External Links
Departments
Equitable Growth, Finance, and Institutions
Externally Hosted Work
Contact Information
Last updated
January 31, 2023
Biography
Gaurav Nayyar is a Senior Economist in the Equitable Growth, Finance and Institutions Vice Presidency at the World Bank, where he joined as a Young Professional in 2013. Previously, he was an Economics Affairs Officer in the Economic Research Division of the World Trade Organization, where he co-led the World Trade Report 2013, Factors Shaping the Future of World Trade. Gaurav’s research interests lie primarily in the areas of economic growth, structural transformation, trade, industrialization, and firm productivity, and he has published in a variety of academic journals on these issues. His previous books include Trouble in the Making? The Future of Manufacturing-Led Development (with Mary Hallward-Driemeier), and The Service Sector in India’s Development (published by Cambridge University Press). Gaurav holds a D.Phil in Economics from the University of Oxford, where he was a Dorothy Hodgkin Scholar. His other alma maters include the London School of Economics and Political Science, the University of Cambridge, and St. Stephen’s College, University of Delhi.
Publication Search Results
1 - 10 of 16
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Publication
Gearing Up for the Future of Manufacturing in Bangladesh
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2021-06-21)Labor-intensive, export-oriented manufacturing driven by the ready-made garments industry has transformed Bangladesh's economy. But with automation, changing trade patterns and servicification reducing the importance of wage costs globally, the creation of more sustainable jobs in the manufacturing sector now needs the upgradation of firms' capabilities and technology adoption. Drawing on the World Bank's "Bangladesh Firm-level Adoption of Technology Survey", this report shows that there is significant scope to improve the manufacturing sector's performance and future prospects by promoting the adoption of better technologies in firms. It discusses how Bangladesh can achieve this aim through policies that address informational barriers to the acquisition of capabilities in firms, leverage international connectivity for technology diffusion, and strengthen key markets and institutions that underpin firms investment in technology. -
Publication
Industrial Policy, Information, and Government Capacity
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2017-05)Governments are resource and bandwidth constrained, and hence need to prioritize productivity-enhancing policies. To do so requires information on the nature and magnitude of market failures on the one hand, and government’s capacity to redress them successfully on the other. The paper reviews perspectives on vertical (sectoral) and horizontal (factor markets, cluster) policies with an eye to both criteria. It first argues that the case for either cannot be made on the basis of the likelihood of successful implementation: for instance, educational and picking the winner types of policies both run the risks of capture and incompetent execution. However, the profession has been able to establish more convincing market failures for horizontal policies than for vertical policies. Most of the recent approaches to identifying failures around particular goods, the paper argues, are of limited help. Hence, for a given difficulty of execution, the former are generally to be preferred. A second critical message is that improving the quality of governance in terms of collecting information, coordination ability, and defending against capture is critical to successful implementation of productivity policies and should be central on the policy agenda. -
Publication
FDI and the Skill Premium: Evidence from Emerging Economies
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2018-10)Foreign direct investment may play an important role in transferring technologies from high-income to emerging economies, which can lead to uneven effects on the wages of skilled and unskilled workers. This paper combines project-level data on greenfield foreign direct investment with household surveys to estimate the effects of foreign direct investment on the wage skill premium across sectors and regions in seven emerging economies (Brazil, Colombia, Ethiopia, Mexico, the Philippines, South Africa, and Vietnam). The results suggest that foreign direct investment is associated with a higher probability of employment and higher wages for unskilled workers, relative to skilled workers, in six of the seven countries analyzed in this paper. Moreover, the effects of foreign direct investment on wages are relatively larger for unskilled women. -
Publication
When Face-to-Face Interactions Become an Occupational Hazard: Jobs in the Time of COVID-19
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2020-05)There is a crisis of demand brewing around the globe as social distancing becomes the norm to counter the COVID-19 outbreak. So, which parts of the economy are most in the line of fire? Looking at jobs that can be done at home or that require a high degree of face-to-face interactions with consumers can capture complementary but distinct mechanisms to assess this vulnerability. This paper uses data on 900 job titles from the Occupational Information Network (O*NET) database for the United States to demonstrate that there is substantial heterogeneity in vulnerability across industries, income groups, and gender. First, industries vary in whether they emphasize face-to-face interactions and home-based work and the two do not always go hand-in-hand. Second, occupations that are less amenable to home-based work are largely concentrated among the lower wage deciles. Third, a larger share of women's employment is accounted for by occupations that are intensive in face-to-face interactions. -
Publication
Industrial Policy, Information, and Government Capacity
(Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the World Bank, 2018-08)Governments are resource- and bandwidth-constrained, and hence need to prioritize productivity-enhancing policies. To do so requires information on the nature and magnitude of market failures on the one hand, and government's capacity to redress them successfully on the other. This article reviews perspectives on vertical (sectoral) and horizontal (factor markets, cluster) policies with a view to both criteria. We first argue that the case for either vertical or horizontal policies cannot be made on the basis of the likelihood of successful implementation: for instance, educational policies and “picking the winner” types of policies both run the risks of capture and incompetent execution. However, the economics profession has been able to establish more convincing market failures for horizontal policies than for vertical policies. Most of the recent approaches to identifying failures around particular goods are of limited help. Hence, for a given difficulty of execution, the former are generally preferred. A second critical message is that improving the quality of governance in terms of collecting information, coordination ability, and defending against capture is critical to the successful implementation of productivity policies and should be central on the policy agenda. -
Publication
Developing Countries and Services in the New Industrial Paradigm
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2018-12)The traditional export-led manufacturing model provided the twin benefits of productivity gains and job creation for unskilled labor in the past. Over the past two decades, however, the peak shares of manufacturing in value added and employment across a range of developing economies occurred at lower levels of per capita income compared to their high-income, early-industrializer precursors. Looking ahead, there is a concern whether labor-saving technologies associated with Industry 4.0 -- such as robotics, the Internet of Things, and 3-D printing -- will make it even more difficult for lower-income countries to have a significant role in global manufacturing. Can services-led development be an alternative? This paper provides a conceptual framework to inform the discussion, drawing on available empirical evidence from the literature on the subject. The features of manufacturing once thought to be uniquely special for productivity growth are increasingly shared by some services that yield the benefits of scale, greater competition, and technology diffusion associated with international trade. Yet, without sufficient human capital, there are limits to how much labor can be absorbed in these service sectors, which are also highly skill-intensive. Further, while some high-productivity services largely serve final demand or derive demand from several sectors, others are more closely linked to a manufacturing base. -
Publication
Trouble in the Making?: The Future of Manufacturing-Led Development
(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2017-09-20)Globalization and new technologies are impacting the desirability and feasibility of what has historically been the most successful development strategy. Manufacturing has been seen as special, promising both productivity gains and job creation. But trade is slowing. Global value chains (GVC) are maturing. Robotics, artificial intelligence, 3D printing, and the Internet of things are shifting what makes locations attractive for production and threatening significant disruptions in employment. There is a risk of increased polarization, within countries and across countries. Shifting the attention from high-income countries, this report takes the perspective of developing countries to ask: -- If new technologies reduce the importance of low-wage labor, how can developing countries compete? -- Do countries need to industrialize to develop? -- How can countries at different levels of development take advantage of new opportunities? Development strategies need to broaden. Different manufacturing sub-sectors can still provide productivity growth or jobs; fewer can deliver both. Many of the pro-development characteristics traditionally associated with manufacturing--tradability, scale, innovation, learning-by-doing--are increasingly features of services. With faster diffusion of technology, it will be all the more important for countries to improve the enabling environment, remain open to trade, and support capabilities of firms and workers to ensure future prosperity is shared. -
Publication
Does Premature Deindustrialization Matter? The Role of Manufacturing versus Services in Development
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2018-09)The shares of manufacturing in value added and employment across a range of developing economies peaked at lower levels of per capita income compared with their high-income, early-industrializer precursors. Based on the statistical analysis of input-output tables and firm-level data, the paper contributes to the discussion on whether this "premature deindustrialization" matters by showing that: a) the premature declining share of the manufacturing sector is largely not driven by a statistical artifice whereby what was earlier subsumed in manufacturing value added is now accounted for as service sector contributions; b) Some features of manufacturing that were thought of as uniquely special for development, such as scale economies, exports, and innovation, are increasingly shared by services sector firms. Yet, a given service subsector is unlikely to provide opportunities for productivity growth and job creation for unskilled labor simultaneously; c) Some high-productivity services serve final demand or derive demand from several sectors, while others are more closely linked to a manufacturing base. -
Publication
At Your Service?: The Promise of Services-Led Development
(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2021-09-15)Throughout history, industrialization has been synonymous with development. However, the trend of premature deindustrialization and the spread of automation technologies associated with Industry 4.0 has raised concerns that the development model based on export-led manufacturing seen in East Asia will be harder for hitherto less industrialized countries to replicate in the future. Can services-led development be an alternative? Contrary to conventional wisdom, the features of manufacturing that were considered uniquely conducive for productivity growth - such as international trade, scale economies, inter-sectoral linkages, and innovation - are increasingly shared by the services sector. But services are not monolithic. The twin gains of productivity growth and large-scale job creation for relatively low-skilled workers are less likely to come together in any given services subsector. The promise of services-led development in the future will be strengthened to the extent that technological change reduces the trade-off between productivity and jobs, and growth opportunities in services with potential for high productivity do not depend on a manufacturing base. Considering technological change and linkages between sectors while differentiating across types of services, this book assesses the scope of a services-driven development model and policy directions that maximize its potential. -
Publication
Are the 'Poor' Getting Globalized?
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2018-10)One reason that poor people may not capture the full benefit from participation in international markets is that the goods they produce tend to be subject to relatively high trade barriers. This paper analyzes market access barriers faced by households in different income deciles by matching household survey data from India based on the industrial classification of their economic activity. Tariffs in international markets are higher, and nontariff measures more numerous, on goods produced by poor workers than on goods produced by rich workers. Tariffs faced by exporters are higher on goods produced in rural and more remote areas than on those in urban centers, on goods produced by informal enterprises than by formal ones, and on goods produced by women than by men. Furthermore, the global reduction in tariffs from 1996 to 2012 failed to ameliorate these differences. How did we get there? Efforts to protect poor workers across countries resulted in a coordination problem. Indeed, tariff protection in China and the United States is higher on goods produced by poor workers than on goods produced by rich workers. Therefore, if poor workers are employed in similar sectors, then each country's attempts to protect its poor workers by imposing higher tariffs and more nontariff measures on such goods will reduce the access of all poor workers to international markets, and thus limit the gains from trade.