Buised by the COVID-19 pandemic, Indians, like their counterparts elsewhere in the world, are looking for renewal. So, even granting that an annual budget is not a corrective for all ills, evidence of a change in course was expected in…
Budget presentations have turned tiresome for some years now, and for many reasons. Their length, which tends to be way beyond that warranted by substance. The tendency to drone on about off-budget policy initiatives in Part A, most of which…
India’s Constitution puts the bulk of responsibility for the basic goods and services to be provided to citizens on to state governments. That is also why it mandated that independent Finance Commissions be appointed every five years to determine the…
Budgets over the years have become a tiresome spectacle. Much print space and airtime are devoted to the exercise, which on each occasion is presented as an event that would alter the nation’s economic course. Governments and Finance Ministers back…
The United States prepares for moving out of the Trump era with the incoming President promising more rounds of stimulus spending to revive an economy ravaged by Covid-19. Other members of the Organisation of Economic Cooperation and Development, a predominantly…
It’s a paradox that has periodically recurred in recent times. Financial indicators are hugely favourable from the point of view of those who benefit from them, even when the performance of the real economy is poor or dismal. In this…
The complete absence of any meaningful fiscal response from the Indian government in the face of one of the biggest economic crises ever faced, cries out for explanation. One argument has been that the central government is concerned about its…
On December 12, in an outburst of suppressed anger, workers employed at a factory assembling iPhones in Narasapura near Bengaluru ransacked its premises and damaged parked vehicles. The facility is a unit of Wistron, a Taiwanese vendor engaged in assembly…
Discussions of China’s growing global presence normally refer to its large investments overseas and lending by the state-owned China Development Bank and China sponsored multilateral institutions like the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank and New Development Bank. But there has been…
A month after the signing of the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) agreement among 15 countries in the Asia-Pacific, speculation on what could be its economic and strategic fallout has waned. Attention seems to have been diverted by the more…
