governance, political economy, institutional development and economic regulation
The Ukraine crisis brings home the fragility of the passive equilibrium, based on the absence of war rather than the absence of a need for war. Equitable and empowered global rule-making, which inspires trust and respect amongst all nations is still some way-off. Till it becomes a reality, there will always be the temptation to […]
Read More US sanctions on Russia impose global collateral damageThere is a great deal of unnecessary melancholy around the low real growth outturns for the October to December quarter (Q3) FY 2021-22. The gripe, if any, is that Q3 confirms a downward trend in quarter-on-quarter growth rates, down from 20.1 percent in Q1, 8.4 percent in Q2, and now 5.4 percent in Q3. It […]
Read More Ukraine and slowing growth in India- Back to basicsThe Reserve Bank of India-led Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) brewed a storm in a teacup by continuing its accommodative monetary policy stance—retaining the Repo rate (the cost of borrowing from the RBI) at 4 percent and the Reverse Repo (the cost of depositing funds with the RBI) at 3.35 percent. The MPC is a device, initiated in […]
Read More Storm in India’s monetary tea cupA fiscal deficit of 6.4 per cent of GDP on top of a revised fiscal deficit of 6.9 per cent of GDP in the current year and 9.5 per cent the year before is a strong endorsement of what finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman, in her Union Budget speech on February 1, called “the need to nurture growth […]
Read More Budet FY 2023- Good intentions but short on specificsBudgets reflect the economic philosophy, near-term political economy pressures, and the long-term vision of a government. A review of budget metrics (table below) across the twilight years of the Manmohan Singh UPA government and the Modi government reveals a surprisingly elevated level of similarity, despite differentiated specific outcomes. In plainer words, the rulers changed but […]
Read More The Modi budgets- High achievements sans institutionalised changesThe drama and spectacle around Budgets in India are completely undeserved. More than four-fifths of the Union Budget demands relate to expenditure that is carried through from past decisions, leaving little leeway for bold new outlays. And even when such programmes are budgeted, it is unclear who is going to pay for the added expense. […]
Read More Budget Fy 2023 – Saying sorry is okThe dominant view is dire on the impact of the proposed roll back of the three Farm Laws, enacted in haste in 2020, even as the pandemic raged. Opinion is divided whether it is proof of the government’s shallow commitment to deep reform or that it proclaims doom for agriculture, which has committed Hara-kiri by […]
Read More The upside of farm laws repealIndia bought transition time at Glasgow by committing to net zero carbon emissions only by 2070. Advanced economies have mostly clustered around a nearer time frame of 2050, as befits their culpability, in depleting the global carbon envelop, and their enhanced technological and fiscal resources. China chose emissions peaking “before 2030” but a long transition […]
Read More Institutionalizing Net zeroIn the run up to the COP26 Summit in Glasgow on 31st October, enthusiasm bubbles over. This is as it should be. Preserving the world as we know it requires cutting back on the 34 giga tons (2018) of annual CO2 emissions, 37 percent of which is by the 16 percent of the global population in high-income economies. To […]
Read More Sharing the pain at GlasgowGovernments are habitually profligate and gladly eat into an ever-larger share of GDP growth. The United States, the richest, big country in 1990, spent 40.6 percent of GDP on government expenditure. By 2011 its government was spending even more at 43.7 percent of the GDP. Countries which went in the opposite direction were rare- such as […]
Read More To spend or not to spend
Opinion India 