India To Have One Of The Largest Working-Age Populations By 2030 Among G20 Countries

Economic Empowerment

The McKinsey report talks about bringing a large part of the world’s population above the line of economic empowerment to score better on metrics such as growth, inclusion and sustainability. The line of economic empowerment is, however, different from the World Bank’s extreme poverty line.

“The concept of economic empowerment described in this research involves ensuring that everyone has the means to access the full range of basics,” McKinsey said.

The World Bank estimates the extreme poverty line to be at $2.15 per person per day. However, McKinsey quotes other studies which state that in emerging economies on purchasing power parity terms, at $12 per person per day people can meet their basic needs and start to achieve discretionary spending powers. This is also the point where the risk of falling back into poverty is reduced.

For advanced economies, adjusting for their higher cost of living, the line of economic empowerment is $47 per person per day.

On an overall basis, more than half of the population in G20 economies, or 2.6 billion people, live under the line of economic empowerment, the report said. This includes 100 million people living in extreme poverty, 2.2 billion people living under the line of economic empowerment in emerging economies and about 300 million people in advanced economies.

India scores as an exemplar in eight programmes:

Financial And Digital Inclusion: India’s initiatives through Jan Dhan accounts, Aadhaar and mobile-popularly known as the JAM trinity-have improved financial inclusion and increased transparency in the delivery of government subsidies.

Affordable Housing: Targeted government programmes for lower and middle-income group housing have pushed affordability.

Vaccination: India’s efforts through the CoWin portal helped build a holistic vaccination ecosystem.

Healthcare: Apollo Hospitals’ omnichannel end-to-end healthcare system boosts quality, affordability and accessibility of healthcare systems.

Nutritional Crops: India’s latest initiatives to increase awareness and production of millets domestically and globally will improve production of high nutrition crops.

Renewables Push: India’s expansion of its solar footprint through the government and achieving over 60 GW solar capacity in 12 years, from 10 MW, were identified as an exemplar for power.