North-south in India and the world

Last week's issue of The Economist has a great article about India and Narendra Modi's various programs to forge an ever-deeper union, some of them good, some bad. Perhaps the most surprising learning for me was about the tremendous north-south divide in India, and that it is the reverse of what we see in so much of the world. Globally and historically, there's been a tendency for the North, the South poorer. This has historically been the case in the US and was particularly so prior to the Civil War. Europe lorded its wealth over its colonial dominions -- though much of its wealth derived from its forcible takings from them. 

Internally in Europe, wealth divides regionally more by closeness to the center than strictly north-south. So Northern Italy and Spain tower over their southern regions, while the areas around London and Paris are much wealthier than outlying region (outside of Ile-de-France, France's GDP per capita is remarkably even). In Germany, Bavaria and Baden-Wurttemburg in the South are the richest regions -- though the Northern mercantile cities of Hamburg and Bremen are individually the richest. In England the triangle between London, Oxford and Cambridge predominates over the north.

But I digress. To return to the main point: the southern states of India are much richer than the northern ones, with GDP per capita around $10k per person at purchasing price parity, vs. $3k or so for the more populous Uttar Pradesh and Bihar in the north. As one would expect, the populations of the poorer states are growing faster that those of the richer ones (since family sizes tend to decrease as incomes rise since kids become more expensive to rear, longevity rises, and the ability and propensity to save rises). 

The apportionment of seats in the legislature has been legally fixed for about half a century to encourage states to adopt population control programs and provide an incentive for success. This presages fireworks, as Modi's BJP has its power base in the north... 

By now I'm kind of reprising the article and I've exceeded my allotted time to blog. Nuff to say the political economy of India is complicated and its survival as a unified country is by no means guaranteed.