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My Friend Sancho

My first book, My Friend Sancho, was published in May 2009, and went on to become the biggest selling debut novel released that year in India. It is a contemporary love story set in Mumbai, and had earlier been longlisted for the Man Asian Literary Prize 2008. To learn more about the book, click here.


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Click here for more about my publisher, Hachette India.


My posts on India Uncut about My Friend Sancho can be found here.


Bastiat Prize 2007 Winner

Recent entries

The Bombzooka Question

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Thodi Si Tu Lift Karade

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The Gathering Birds

’Before anyone else was interested in the ornithology of terror he saw the gathering birds,’ Salman Rushdie writes about…

‘A Living Room Full of Guys’

Check out this TED Talk by Tony Porter on how men get trapped in a ‘Manbox’—and women bear the…

15 June, 2007

Does economic growth lead to family breakdown?

Yes, says Chris Dillow, and explains why:

Start with the dishwasher. This embodies an important feature of economic growth - it’s given us labour-saving household technologies. Thanks to dishwashers, microwaves and the like, people no longer need to spend hours on household chores.

This has had several effects, described by Jeremy Greenwood. It means it’s more technically feasible for men and women to live alone. That alone has reduced the marriage rate and increased the divorce rate. It also means wives have had the time to enter the workforce. That’s led to more affairs - as men and women meet more often away from their spouses eyes at the workplace. And in giving women an income outside marriage, it’s increased their ability to divorce their hubbies.

This, though, is not the only way in which divorce has risen, and marriage fallen, because women no longer need a meal ticket. One feature of economic growth is a decline in relative demand for physical strength and increased demand for intellectual or social skills. This too has led to increased numbers of women workers - and the more skilled among them are not marrying and having children.

There’s more, read the full post.

Frankly, if economic growth leads to family breakdown because it empowers women and gives them more control over their lives, then I’m not going to mourn the family too much. It’s far better to aim for individual happiness than to pay homage to family values and suchlike.

(Link via SMS from Just Mohit, who saw it excerpted in Mint.)

Posted by Amit Varma in Economics

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