Affiliated Faculty

Summary of Expertise

Digital Economy, Indian Economy, Indian-Americans, Sikhs and Punjab

Research Interests

Industrial organization, political economy, economic development, technology and innovation, digital technology, South Asian immigrants in the U.S., Indian economy, Sikhs and the Punjab

Biography, Education and Training

Nirvikar Singh is currently Co-Director of the Center for Analytical Finance at UCSC, of which he was the founding Director. From 2010 to 2020, he held the Sarbjit Singh Aurora Chair of Sikh and Punjabi Studies at UCSC. He has previously directed the UCSC South Asian Studies Initiative. He has served as a member of the Advisory Group to the Finance Minister of India on G-20 matters, and Consultant to the Chief Economic Adviser, Ministry of Finance, Government of India. He is currently serving on the Expert Group on post-Covid-19 economic recovery formed by the Chief Minister of Punjab state in India. At UCSC, he has previously served as Director of the Santa Cruz Center for International Economics, Co-Director of the Center for Global, International and Regional Studies, and Special Advisor to the Chancellor.  In the 1990s, he organized one of the first major US conferences on Indian economic reform. He received his PhD from the University of California, Berkeley, and his BSc and MSc from the London School of Economics, where he was awarded the Allyn Young Prize, Gonner Prize and Ely Devons Prize.

Professor Singh’s current research topics include entrepreneurship, information technology and development, electronic commerce, business strategy, political economy, federalism, economic growth, the Indian economy, and Sikh and Punjabi studies. He has authored over 100 research papers and co-authored or co-edited six books: Joint Ventures, International Investment and Technology Transfer; The Political Economy of Federalism in India; and Waiting to Connect: India IT Revolution Bypasses the Domestic Industry; Handbook of the Economics of the Pacific Rim; Economic Transformation of a Developing Economy: The Experience of Punjab, India; and The Other One Percent: Indians in America. He has also served as an advisor for several startups and knowledge services firms in Silicon Valley and in India.

Honors, Awards and Grants

Entrepreneurship in the Indian Diaspora (with Devesh Kapur), Center for Advanced Study of India, University of Pennsylvania

Foreign Currency Borrowing by Indian Firms (with Ila Patnaik and Ajay Shah), International Growth Centre

Selected Publications

Structural Change and Economic Growth in India: Patterns and Heterogeneity Among the States and Possible Implications for Post-Pandemic Recovery (with A. Sanyal), India Policy Forum, 2021

Environmental Issues, Economic Policies and Agricultural Development: The Case of Punjab, India (with R. Liu and A. Sanyal), Indian Public Policy Review, 2 (2): 25-48, 2020

Mental Health Policy in India: Seven Sets of Questions and Some Answers (with A. Mirza), Journal of Mental Health Policy and Economics, 22 (1), pp. 25-37, 2019

The Three Pillars of Sikhism: A Note on Origins, Sikh Research Journal, 4 (1), pp. 45-52, 2019

What Can We Learn from Global and Regional Rankings of Countries?, (with H. Aytug and S.H. Law), Millennial Asia, 9 (2), pp. 119-139, 2018

Revisiting the finance-innovation nexus: Evidence from a non-linear approach (with S.H. Law and W.C. Lee), Journal of Innovation and Knowledge, 3 (3), pp. 143-153, 2018

The Challenge of Translating the Guru Granth Sahib: An Illustration and Preliminary Reflections, Sikh Research Journal, 2017, 2 (2), March 2017

Journal of Punjab Studies, Two Issue Special Volume – The Legacy of 1984 and Contemporary Challenges for Punjab, India, ed. (with J.S. Chima). Santa Barbara: Center for Sikh and Punjabi Studies

The Other One Percent: Indians in America (with S. Chakravorty and D. Kapur), New York: Oxford University Press, 2016

Economic Transformation of a Developing Economy: The Experience of Punjab, India, ed. (with L. Singh), Singapore: Springer, 2016

Reforming India’s Institutions of Public Expenditure Governance, in eds. D. Kapur, P. B. Mehta and M. Vaishnav, Rethinking Public Institutions in India, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, pp. 180-224, 2017

Guest Editor’s Introduction to Part 1 (with J.S. Chima), Journal of Punjab Studies, Special Volume – The Legacy of 1984 and Contemporary Challenges for Punjab, India, 22 (1), pp. 1-4, 2017

Guest Editor’s Introduction to Part 2 (with J.S. Chima), Journal of Punjab Studies, Special Volume – The Legacy of 1984 and Contemporary Challenges for Punjab, India, 22 (2), pp. 203-207, 2017

How Do Extreme Global Shocks Affect Foreign Portfolio Investment? An Event Study for India (with J. Rabanal and A. Yaha), Emerging Markets Finance and Trade, 53 (8), 1923-38, 2017

Freedom and Digital India, in P.J. Shah (ed.), Liberalism in India: Past, Present and Future, New Delhi: Centre for Civil Society, pp. 47-59, 2016

Fiscal Federalism, in S. Choudhry, M. Khosla and P.B. Mehta (eds.), Oxford Handbook of the Indian Constitution, New York, Oxford University Press, pp. 521-539, 2016

Introduction (with L. Singh), in Economic Transformation of a Developing Economy: The Experience of Punjab, India, eds. (L. Singh and N. Singh), Singapore: Springer, pp. 1-25, 2016

Breaking the Mould: Thoughts on Punjab's Future Economic Development, in Economic Transformation of a Developing Economy: The Experience of Punjab, India, eds. (L. Singh and N. Singh), Singapore: Springer, pp. 451-456, 2016

Heterogeneous Patterns of Financial Development: Implications for Asian Financial Integration (with L. Bun), International Economic Journal 30 (2), pp. 243-271, 2016

Cosmopolitanism, Tradition and Identity: Framing the Sikh Experience in California, Sikh Research Journal, 1 (5), September, 2016

Foreign Currency Borrowing by Indian Firms: Toward a New Policy Framework (with I. Patnaik and A. Shah), India Policy Forum, Vol. 12, pp. 139-174, 2015

Analysing the Structural Change and Growth Relationship in India (with O. Cortuk), Economic and Political Weekly, Vol. 50 (24), pp. 91-98, 2015

Guest Editor’s Introduction, India Review, Special Issue – India’s Economy: Growth, Governance and Reform, 14 (1), pp. 1-7, 2015

Regional Inequality in India in the 1990s: A District-level View, (with J. Kendall, R. K. Jain, and J. Chander), Economic and Political Weekly, Vol. 49 (15), pp. 71-76, 2014

Financial Integration and Financial Development in East Asia, (with I. Kaur), Millennial Asia, Vol. 5 (1), pp. 1-22 , 2014

Does Too Much Finance Harm Economic Growth?, (with S.H. Law), Journal of Banking and Finance, Vol. 41, pp. 36-44 , 2014

Markets, Morals and Motives: Economics and the Guru Granth Sahib, Sikh Review, 2013

China, India, and Industrial Policy for Inclusive Growth (with I. Kaur), China Economic Policy Review, Vol. 2(1), pp. 1375001-1 to 27, 2013

Bridging the Digital Divide in Rural India: Lessons from a Survey in Four States (with Y. Zhou, K. Williams, J. Kendall and P.D. Kaushik), Review of Market Integration, Vol. 5 (1), pp. 1-42 , 2013

Dove or Hawk? Characterizing Monetary Policy Regime Switches in India (with M. Hutchison and R. Sengupta), Emerging Markets Review, Vol. 16, pp. 181-202 , 2013

Foreign Investors under Stress: Evidence from India (with I. Patnaik and A. Shah), International Finance, Vol. 16 (2), pp. 213-244 , 2013

Turkey’s Trilemma Trade-offs: Is there a role for reserves? (with O. Cortuk), Iktisat Isletme ve Finans, Vol. 28 (328), pp. 105-122 , 2013

Trade productivity upgrading, trade fragmentation, and FDI in manufacturing: The Asian development experience (with J. Mora), Indian Growth and Development Review, Vol. 6 (1), pp. 61-87, 2013

Trade Dynamics in the East Asian Miracle: A Time Series Analysis of US–East Asia Commodity Trade, 1962–1992 (with T. Carolan and J. Mora), Millennial Asia, Vol. 4 (1), pp. 87-108 , 2013

Information Technology and Productivity in Indian Manufacturing (with S. Sharma), India Policy Forum, Vol. 9, pp. 187-229, 2012

Effectiveness of Capital Controls in India: Evidence from the Offshore NDF Market (with M. Hutchison and G. Pasricha), IMF Economic Review, Vol. 60, pp. 395–438 , 2012

Internet Kiosks in Rural India: Gender, Caste and Location (with J. Kendall),  Review of Market Integration, Vol. 4 (1), pp. 1-43, 2012

Information Technology and its Role in India’s Economic Development: A Review, in ed. S. Mahendra Dev and S. Babu, Development in India: Micro and Macro Perspectives, Singapore: Springer, 283-312, 2015

India’s Trilemma: Financial Liberalization, Exchange Rates and Monetary Policy (with Michael M. Hutchison and Rajeswari Sengupta), World Economy, 35 (1), 3-18, 2012

The Digital Divide in Rural South Asia: Survey Evidence from Bangladesh, Nepal and Sri Lanka (with Yan Zhou and P. D. Kaushik), Indian Institute of Management (Bangalore) Review, 23, 15-29, 2011

Some Market Measures of Capital Account Liberalization in India, (with Michael Hutchison and Gurnain Pasricha), in China and Asia in the Global Economy, ed. Yin-Wong Cheung and Guonan Ma, World Scientific Publishing, 2011

Expenditure Governance and Information Technology: Assessing India’s Situation and Potential, India Review, 9 (2), 107-139, 2010

Estimating a Monetary Policy Rule for India, (with Michael Hutchison and Rajeswari Sengupta), Economic and Political Weekly, 45 (38), 67-69, 2010

The Management of International Rivers as Demands Grow and Supplies Tighten: India, China, Nepal, Pakistan, Bangladesh, (with B. Crow), India Review, 8 (3), 306-339, 2009

Intermediaries in E-Commerce: Value Creation Roles, in Encyclopedia of E-Business Development and Management in the Digital Economy, ed., In Lee, Hershey, PA: IGI Global, 188-197, 2009

Equilibrium Vengeance (with D. Friedman), Games and Economic Behavior, 66 (2), 813-829, 2008

Transaction Costs, Information Technology and Development, Indian Growth and Development Review, 1 (2), 212-236, 2008

Decentralization and Public Delivery of Health Care Services in India, Health Affairs, 27, no. 4 991-1001, 2008

Buy-It-Now: A Hybrid Market Institution (with S. Anderson, D. Friedman and G. Milam), Journal of Electronic Commerce Research, 9 (2), 137-153, 2008

Crossing a Chasm: Technologies, Institutions and Policies for Developing a Regional IT Industry, in ICTs and Indian Social Change: Diffusion, Poverty and Governance, Ashwani Saith, M. Vijayabaskar and V. Gayathri ed., New Delhi: Sage Publications, 192-218, 2008

Services-Led Industrialization in India: Assessment and Lessons, in Industrial Development for the 21st Century: Sustainable Development Perspectives, ed. David O’Connor, New York: Orient Longman, 235-291, 2008

Market Institutions: An Expository Essay, Economics, Management, and Financial Markets, 5(2), 210-36, 2010

Fiscal Decentralization in China and India: Competitive, Cooperative or Market Preserving Federalism?, Public Finance and Management, 9 (1), available at http://www.spaef.com/article.php?id=433, 2007

Seller Strategies on eBay: Does Size Matter?”, (with Steve Anderson, Daniel Friedman and Garrett Milam) International Journal of Electronic Business, Vol. 5, No. 6, 643-669, 2007

Teaching Interests

Finance, E-commerce, Microeconomic Theory