The present study discusses the short- and long-run trade patterns of India and China. Applying revealed comparative advantage (RCA) and bilateral RCA, this study specifically tries to find out the pattern of exports and areas of specialization of the economies under study. Major findings suggest that both the countries have been performing well, in terms of merchandise trade exports, over the past few decades, especially since 2000. The export-performing behaviour of India and China with each other, as well as with the world, is seen quite general in nature. In other words, irrespective of their institutional and structural differences, both India and China maintain almost the same upward moving trend with respect to the flow of exports between them and that with the world market. However, once we go from Standard International Trade Classification (SITC) two-digit to SITC four-digit level of analysis, the sample economies reveal their specialized products. At the disaggregate level, India’s export basket is void of food products and raw materials, and it generally contains engineering goods and technologically driven products as advantageous products. The study finds that the areas of specialization are much wider, and the technology-embedded products are larger for China as compared to India. JEL: F10, F11, F43

With state‐level panel data from the Indian manufacturing sector for 2000–12, and labour turnover as a proxy for employment adjustments, the authors estimate differential effects of demand shocks on employment adjustment across states with high and low levels of EPL. They find that EPL does not hinder employment adjustment; the response of labour separation rates to negative demand shocks is relatively higher in states with high levels of EPL, and labour turnover is inversely associated with EPL, which may be viewed as indicative of the beneficial effects of EPL for both enterprises and workers.

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This article aims at providing an eclectic analysis of the theory of optimum currency areas (OCAs). Although the basic tenets of the theory were anticipated during the late 1940s and the 1950s, the theory was developed and maturated in three highly influential papers of Mundell (1961), McKinnon (1963) and Kenen (1969). However, because of internal conflicts and contradictions, the theory gathered gloom for the next two decades before it could make a solid comeback in the early 1990s. Much of the reason of this revival was the efforts towards the reconciliation of these internal conflicts. During this period, the theory moved beyond the usual cost–benefit analysis and reflected a shift from the criteria that emphasise on the state of the economy towards the criteria that focus on desired policy trade-offs. Recent advancements in the area using dynamic general equilibrium analysis shows that the revival of interest in the theory of OCA reflects developments in a literature that has little to do with the subject of OCAs itself. The merit of the OCA theory is that it helps to bring together several strands of the literature on monetary integration.