Agricultural change and inequality in Palanpur, 1957-84

This chapter analyzes changes in the distribution of income and land in the north Indian village of Palanpur on the basis of four surveys conducted over a 27 year interval. Average per capita income from agricultural activities during 1957-58 and 1962/63 was roughly constant, grew by 74% between 1962-63 and 1974-75, and then declined by roughly half between 1974/75 and 1983/84. The increase in incomes between 1962/63 and 1974/75 was spread over the entire income distribution, with the largest rise among those around the median, so that inequality between these two years decreased. In the decade after 1974, there was a substantial increase in the leasing out of land by small landholders, which may in part reflect the cost of, or lack of access to, credit. The largest impact on income inequality in the decade after 1974/75 came from outside jobs, the source of one-third of total income in Palanpur by 1983/84. -Authors