ACADEMIC PUBLICATIONS
LABOUR AND EMPLOYMENT
Thomas, Jayan Jose (2023) ‘Employment Growth and Industrial Policy: The Challenge for Indian States’, Indian Journal of Labour Economics, Springer Nature, 66(1): 113–129. Read the full article here.
Thomas, Jayan Jose (2020) ‘Labour Market Changes in India, 2005-2018: Missing the Demographic Window of Opportunity?’, Economic and Political Weekly, 22 August 2020, vol. 55, no. 34, pp. 57-63. Read the full article here.
(This article has been cited in the New York Times, 23 March 2021)
Thomas, Jayan Jose (2020) ‘Sectoral Shifts and Declining Labour Participation Rate of Women’, in Swaminathan, Madhura, Shruti Nagbhushan and V.K. Ramachandran (eds.) (2020) Women and Work in Rural India, Columbia University Press, New York and Tulika Books, New Delhi. Read the full article here.
Thomas, Jayan Jose (2015) ‘India’s Labour Market During The 2000s: An Overview’ in Ramaswamy, K.V (ed.) (2015), Labour, Employment and Economic Growth in India, Cambridge University Press, New Delhi, pp. 21-56.Read the full article here.
Thomas, Jayan Jose and Jayesh, M.P (2015) ‘Changes in India’s Rural Labour Market in the 2000s: Evidence from the Census of India and the National Sample Survey’ (with M.P. Jayesh), Review of Agrarian Studies, Vol. 6, No. 1, January-June 2016. Read the full article here.
Thomas, Jayan Jose (2012) ‘India’s Labour Market During the 2000s: Surveying the Changes’, Economic and Political Weekly, 22 December 2012, Vol.47, No. 51, pp. 39-51. Read the full article here.
‘Locked in a Low-Skill Equilibrium: Trends in Labour Supply and Demand in India’, Indian Journal of Labour Economics, 54 (2): 195-218, April-June 2011.
‘Employment and Wages’ in Economic Change in the Lower Cauvery Delta: A Study of Palakurichi and Venmani, in Madhura Swaminathan, V. Surjit and V.K. Ramachandran (eds.) (2024), Tulika Books and Columbia University Press, pp.238-58 (with Satheesha, B. )
INDUSTRY AND THE MACROECONOMY
‘The limits to growth of India’s Garment Industry’, Economic and Political Weekly, 24 August 2024, Vol.59, No. 34, pp. 107-113 (with Chinju Johny)
‘For a Wage-led Revival of Indian Manufacturing’, in State of the Indian Economy 2024, Satyaki Roy (ed.), Aakar Books, New Delhi.
Thomas, Jayan Jose (2023) ‘Employment Growth and Industrial Policy: The Challenge for Indian States’, Indian Journal of Labour Economics, Springer Nature, 66(1): 113–129. Read the full article here.
Thomas, Jayan Jose (2021) ‘Has Labour Rigidiy Slowed Down Employment Growth in Indian Manufacturing’ in Mani, Sunil and Chidambaran G. Iyer (2021), India’s Economy and Society: Lateral Explorations, Springer. pp. 327-354. Read the full article here.
Thomas, Jayan Jose (2018) ‘Economic Growth without Employment: The Story of Indian Manufacturing’, in Elizabeth Hill and Amitendu Palit (eds.) (2018) Employment Policy in Emerging Economies: The Indian Case’, Routledge, London and New York, pp. 83-101. Read the full article here.
‘Regional Aspects of Indian Industrialization’ in Chandrasekhar, C. P. (2015) Indian Industrialization, Oxford University Press, New Delhi.
‘Explaining the ‘Jobless’ Growth in Indian Manufacturing’, Journal of the Asia Pacific Economy, Vol. 18, No. 4, pp. 673-692, 2013.
‘Manufacturing in India: Has there been a Revival since the 1990s?’ in Kathuria, Vinish et al. (2014) (eds.) Productivity in Indian Manufacturing: Measurement, Methods and Analysis, Routledge, New Delhi.
‘Indian Manufacturing: The Road Ahead’, chapter in Tan, Tai Yong (ed.) (2010), South Asia: Societies in Political and Economic Transition. New Delhi: Manohar Publishers.
‘A Review of Indian Manufacturing’, in Parikh, Kirit and Radhakrishna, R (eds.) (2002), India Development Report 2002, Oxford University Press, New Delhi.
POLITICAL ECONOMY OF DEVELOPMENT
Thomas, Jayan Jose (2022) ‘Covid-19 and the Indian economy: the debate about a wage-led recovery’ in Lazzarini, A. and Melnik, D. (eds.) (2022) Economists and COVID-19 – Ideas, Theories and Policies During the Pandemic, Springer, pp. 27-46. Read the full article here.
Thomas, Jayan Jose (2014) ‘Public Sector Units in India and China: Inefficient Producers or Creators of Crucial Knowledge Assets?’ in Brødsgaard, Kjeld Erik (ed.) (2014), Globalization and Public Sector Reform in China, Routledge. Read the full article here.
‘Paddy Cultivation in Kerala: A Field Report’, Review of Agrarian Studies, Volume 1, Number 2 (July-December, 2011).
‘An Uneasy Coexistence: The New and the Old in Indian Industry and Services’, chapter in D’Costa, Anthony (ed.) (2010), A New India: Critical Reflections in the Long Twentieth Century, Anthem Press, London.
‘Innovation in India and China: Challenges and Prospects in Pharmaceuticals and Biotechnology’, chapter in Parayil, Govindan and D’Costa, Anthony P. (eds.) (2008), The New Asian Innovation Dynamics: China and India in Perspective, Palgrave Macmillan Ltd. , Basingstoke, UK.
‘Informational Development in Rural Areas: Some Evidence from Kerala and Andhra Pradesh’ in Parayil, Govindan (ed.) (2006), Political Economy and Information Capitalism in India: Digital Divide, Development Divide and Equity, Palgrave Macmillan Ltd., Basingstoke, UK.
Thomas, Jayan Jose (2008) ‘Bridging the Social and Digital Divides in Andhra Pradesh and Kerala: A Capabilities Approach’ (with Govindan Parayil), Development and Change, May 2008, Vol.39, No. 3, pp. 409–35. Read the full article here.
Thomas, Jayan Jose (2005) ‘Kerala’s Industrial Backwardness: A Case of Path Dependence in Industrialization?’ World Development, May 2005, Vol.33, No.5, pp. 763-783. Read the full article here.
‘New Technologies for India’s Development,’ in Parikh, Kirit and Radhakrishna, R (ed.) (2005), India Development Report 2004-05, Oxford University Press, New Delhi, pp. 126-40.
‘Labour in the New Economy: An Indian Perspective’, Indian Journal of Labour Economics, Vol. 48, No.4, pp. 821-35, Annual Issue, December 2005.
‘Labour and Industrialization in Kerala’ in Indian Journal of Labour Economics, Vol. 46, No.4, pp. 575-92., June-December 2003.
OPINIONS AND ESSAYS
‘Oil, Power, and Politics of Disruption’, The Hindu, 20 March 2026.
Thomas, Jayan Jose (2025), ‘How India’s Youth can Challenge U.S. Tariffs, The Hindu, Text and Context, 20 August 2025
Thomas, Jayan Jose (2025), ‘Will Trump’s Tariffs Bring in a Recession?, The Hindu, Text and Context, 14 April
‘Is consumption enough to drive growth?’, The Hindu, February 21, 2025.
‘Indian Industry Needs Innovation, not Mindless Toil’, The Hindu, February 24, 2025.
‘Should State Governments Borrow More?’, The Hindu, 4 April 2024
‘The Fiscal Challenge to Kerala’s Development’, The Hindu, 1 January 2024. Read here.
‘Propelling India’s development the right way’, The Hindu, 22 September 2023. Read here.
‘India needs a budget for its Young’, The Hindu, 22 February 2023. Click here.
‘The Silverline is not a Vanity Project’, The Hindu, 1 March 2022. Click here.
‘Can India become a technology leader?’,The Hindu, 20 December 2021.Click here.
‘The Achievements and Challenges of the ‘Kerala Model’, The India Forum, 2 July 2021.
‘India’s Poor may have lost Rs. 4 lakh crore in the Corona virus Lockdown’, Scroll, 4 June 2020.
‘Boost Wages to Stimulate India’s Growth’, The Hindu, 6 May 2020. Click here.
‘Misses in Manufacturing’, Frontline, March 13, 2020.Click here.
‘Creating Jobs for Young India’, The Hindu, October 1, 2019. Click here.
Jobs and Gloom, The Frontline, March 1, 2019. Click here.
‘The Job Riddle? India’s Demographic Profile Can Solve it’, Moneycontrol, December 31, 2019.
‘Make Planning Fashionable Again’, The Hindu, December 4, 2018. Click here.
Thomas, Jayan Jose (2016), ‘How to be a Model State again?’, Hindu , 15 August 2016.
Thomas, Jayan Jose (2016), ‘Can India beat this Slowdown?’, Hindu , 17 February 2016.
Thomas, Jayan Jose (2015), ‘Yuan makes its first market move?’, Hindu , 20 August 2015.
Thomas, Jayan Jose (2015), ‘Dragon power on display’, Hindu , 7 April 2015.
Thomas, Jayan Jose (2013), ‘A woman-shaped gap in the Indian workforce’, Hindu , 9 January 2013.
WORKING PAPERS
‘Can India Fulfil the Aspirations of its Young? Jobs, Inequalities, and the Way Forward’, Selected for presentation at the World at a Turning Point: Cornell Conference on Development Economics and Law, October 3 to 5, 2024 in Ithaca, New York
‘India’s Rice Exports, World’s Food Security Challenges’, Institute of South Asian Studies (ISAS), National University of Singapore (NUS), Working Paper No. 370, 30 August 2024 (with B. Satheesha)
‘Labour and Industrialization: Can India and China Learn from each other?’, Ashoka University and China-India Foundation.
Kerala: Economic Growth and Investment Opportunities, Monograph published by Institute of South Asian Studies (ISAS), Singapore, 2007.
‘Knowledge Economies in India, China and Singapore: Case Studies of Pharmaceuticals and Biotechnology: Issues and Prospects’, ISAS Working Paper No.18, Institute of South Asian Studies, Singapore, January 2007.
Labour Economy Development 
