In the sprawling industrial corridors of India’s garment manufacturing hubs, the rhythmic hum of sewing machines often masks a complex human reality. For decades, the global manufacturing narrative has been dominated by a “race to the bottom”, a search for the lowest costs and highest speeds, often at the expense of those behind the machines. But in 2017, a group of researchers and business leaders decided to challenge this status quo not with slogans, but with the cold, hard logic of data.
Today, that mission has reached the highest corridors of power. The Economic Survey 2025-26, the foundational document detailing the health of the Indian economy, has officially recognized the work of Good Business Lab (GBL). It is a defining moment for the organization, signaling a national shift where worker wellbeing is no longer seen as a “soft” corporate social responsibility (CSR) goal, but as a central driver of industrial competitiveness.
The Evidence Revolution
Founded in 2017 by economists Achyuta Adhvaryu and Anant Nyshadham alongside business leader Anant Ahuja, Good Business Lab operates at the intersection of human dignity and economic performance. The formula seems almost too simple: treat workers well, and businesses thrive. But GBL doesn’t rely on idealism, it demands proof.
“GBL is a global NGO committed to advancing worker wellbeing through generating evidence-backed insights that show how investing in human capital leads to measurable business outcomes and economic growth,” explain Sowmya Dhanaraj, Associate Director (Research), and Smit Gade, Senior Director (Data and Research).
Their laboratory is the real world, where millions of low-wage workers, especially women, navigate daily indignities that chip away at both their potential and their employers’ productivity.
Recognition at the Highest Level
When GBL’s work appeared in the Economic Survey 2025–26, it marked more than organizational validation. It signaled that decision-makers are beginning to recognize what GBL has been proving for years: worker wellbeing isn’t corporate charity, it’s economic strategy.
The recognition carries particular weight as India pursues its Viksit Bharat vision, confronting stubborn challenges around women’s workforce participation. GBL’s models directly tackle the retention barriers, inadequate support systems, financial precarity, that keep talented women from fully contributing to economic growth.
“Being featured reinforces our belief that evidence-driven research rooted in the lived realities of the workers can inform economic thinking,” Dhanaraj and Gade note. The acknowledgment fuels their conviction that the space where wellbeing meets productivity holds untapped potential for transformation.
Why Garments?
The garment sector became GBL’s proving ground for strategic reasons. Thousands of workers performing repetitive tasks create clear metrics. The workforce skews heavily toward low-income women confronting what researchers call “sticky floors”, invisible barriers built from gender stereotypes, migration-induced isolation, and financial traps that erode focus even when workers have bank access.
Starting with Gap Inc.’s P.A.C.E. program at a garment factory. GBL discovered that soft skills training unlocked outsized gains, expanded across retail, automotive, construction, and platform work worldwide.
“Garment manufacturing combines scale, vulnerability, and measurability,” the GBL leaders explain. In an industry where margins are tight and turnover devastating, the factory floor becomes the ideal lever for demonstrating how wellbeing and performance feed each other.
The Loneliness Epidemic
Migrant women trade rural support networks for urban factory work, arriving in cities where loneliness becomes a crushing force. The result: depression rates soar and turnover hits 75%.
GBL’s response was deliberately low-tech. The Buddy System pairs junior workers with senior colleagues for regular check-ins, conversations that happen in factories and hostels, cost almost nothing to implement, and carry zero stigma.
The results exceeded expectations: depression dropped 5%, productivity climbed 6.4% overall and 12% among senior buddies. The intervention also has the potential to generate a 54% return on the firm’s initial investment over time , strengthening the business case for adoption at scale.
“It isn’t often that we get to sit down, making daily factory life a little less lonely,” notes Kamala, a program participant. What started as structured peer support evolved into genuine friendship, bonds that lasted beyond the formal program.
The shift, as workers described it, moved relationships from “brief and transactional” to something sustaining.
Breaking the Payday Trap
When wages arrive monthly but expenses hit daily, the math becomes brutal. Low-wage workers fall into predatory lending cycles, borrowing at extortionate rates to cover gaps between paydays. “Something as basic as covering medical bills or paying their children’s tuition fee would push them to seek loans from friends or family or moneylenders making them susceptible to exorbitant interests and even violence and stress,” GBL researchers noted.
GBL’s Earned Wage Access app tackles this mismatch head-on, allowing workers to withdraw earned pay instantly through simple Android interfaces on factory tablets. QR codes on ID cards enable access, with interactive training and support staff helping even first-time users who “did not know how to even use an ATM card to withdraw their money.”
The intervention slashed informal borrowing by 33%, reduced skipping essential purchases like medicine or food by 20%, cut attrition 24%, and boosted productivity 8%. “By clearing the ‘mental clutter’ of financial stress, workers were able to perform more efficiently,” explained the study. More than efficiency gains, it restored agency, workers facing crises could respond without desperation or quitting for final settlements.
Yet scalability poses challenges in smaller operations. “We started with piloting this for women workers, all of whom received their wages on the seventh of every month in their bank accounts,” Sowmya Dhanaraj noted, highlighting formal settings’ stability. In smaller factories or informal sectors, “employment and cash flows are less stable,” complicating factory-borne costs and digital infrastructure needs.
“Access to earned wages led to an 8% increase in productivity, alongside reductions in financial stress,” Sowmya Dhanaraj and Smit Gade emphasized. “Worker Wellbeing is Good Business.”
Silence Around Sexual Health
Urban migration strips women of the village health workers who once provided information and support. In their absence, menstrual issues go unaddressed, contraception becomes guesswork, and workplace harassment festers in silence.
GBL designed 16-week interventions built on insights from 100 workers, small-group sessions led by trained facilitators, using visuals instead of text-heavy materials, held in private factory spaces where women could speak freely about topics like consent, contraception, and violence.
“Out of 100+ women, one or two dropped out saying ‘this is not good, you’re not teaching good things,'” Sowmya Dhanaraj shared, highlighting initial resistance. Yet attendance remained strong as camaraderie built: “Over time, they saw they are not alone. When you give safe spaces, they realize it’s not just an individual problem.'”
Knowledge of sexual and reproductive health jumped 65.3%, with menstrual health understanding more than doubling at 114%. Attitudes toward contraception shifted 60.4%. “Our training increased their confidence in acknowledging sexual harassment is common and happened to them,” noted Dhanaraj.
The Business Case, Proven
GBL’s commitment to randomized controlled trials ensures every program proves its worth on dual measures: human wellbeing and economic return.
STITCH supervisor training increased productivity 7.3%, reduced employee departures 15%, and generated $4.5 million in value. The Inache voice platform trimmed absenteeism 13% while growing output 4.3%. Earned Wage Access, the Buddy System, sexual health interventions, each underwent rigorous testing, iteration based on causal proof, and refinement until the impact became economically undeniable.
“By rooting our work in rigorous evidence, GBL ensures that social impact interventions are systemically effective and economically viable,” the leaders affirm.
Reimagining India’s Workforce
GBL’s ambition extends beyond individual interventions. The organization seeks nothing less than a fundamental mindset shift, among industry leaders and policymakers, that places informal job quality at the center of economic strategy.
The Economic Survey and recent budgets increasingly echo this priority. GBL’s models suggest a path: resilient growth built on investments in worker health, financial security, and productivity. Not as corporate social responsibility, but as the foundation of competitive advantage.
“Improving the quality of jobs is essential for building a resilient and competitive workforce,” Dhanaraj and Gade explain. “Our work aligns closely with India’s priorities under the Viksit Bharat vision.”
Good Business Lab isn’t conducting research for its own sake. It’s writing the blueprint for purpose-driven prosperity, proving that the distance between worker dignity and business success is shorter than anyone imagined. Sometimes, it’s only as far as a conversation between colleagues on a factory floor.
The Logical Indian’s Perspective
Good Business Lab doesn’t just talk about worker rights, they prove them. In an India where 90% of workers toil informally, GBL delivers factory-floor evidence: 12% productivity from peer mentoring, 33% less debt stress from instant wages, 65% SRH knowledge leap from safe conversations.
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