Praxeology: My Reflexions on India

Indian planning commission is out with yet another poverty estimate . They released this estimate yesterday which announced a decline in the incidence of poverty by 7.3 per cent over the past five years and stating that anyone with a daily consumption expenditure of Rs. 28.35 and Rs. 22.42 in urban and rural areas respectively is above the poverty line. Any sane person with a sensitive brain will immediately spot the planning commission shenanigans in these estimates. Let aside the whole gimmickry of measuring poverty, the poverty line [sic] which they have used to measure [sic] poverty - viz., 28.35 rupees in urban and 22.42 rupees in rural areas - is a cruel joke on the poor people of this country. In their lust of lowering the poverty numbers to win elections and bureaucratic positions these planning commission members and those phony economists have sold their souls and forgot that 28 and 22 rupees is not even going to buy a decent one time meal for anyone in this highly infla...

The month of March is here and Indian polity is gearing up for the government's annual budget. Just a few hours ago the so-called finance minister presented the budget. Now, the MSM (mainstream media) news channels, newspapers, magazines will be busy 24x7 analyzing the pros and cons of it, while very cleverly (or foolishly) ignoring to address the most fundamental questions re the real meaning of government's budget and its implications for the hoi polloi. I am not going to spend much of my time here in describing what budget really is . Only couple of sentences will suffice for that purpose.  What Budget Really Is? For the brainwashed masses it is a statement of government's annual income [sic] and expenditure, and for those who understand the true nature of government as a Criminal Gang, writ large ( here , here , here , and here ) it is their plan of various ways in which they are going to rob, steal and loot the productive people of this society and then to distribut...

Some very fateful events are taking place in India. Yesterday, India's biggest Industrial elite, Mukesh Ambani and his Reliance Industries Ltd. signed a pact with a French firm Dassault Aviation for partnering in the defense and homeland security sector in India (see here ). Put simply this means, Mukesh Ambani's Reliance Industries, instead of producing mobile phones, electricity, petrol/gas etc., for the common man, will now produce guns & bullets, tanks, rockets, missiles, fighter jets etc., for the government killing machine! Reliance Industries said that, they are entering defense industry sector because they were looking to diversify their business due to a slowdown in their core business of oil and gas. What a wonderful diversification Mr. Ambani! Many of you - who have taken some elementary course in economics - must be knowing that in our scarcity ridden world there is an opportunity cost of every action that we take. The implication of this human action law is t...

The phony Indian economy is out of whack since the day when RBI started increasing its interest rate e.g., Dec 2011 IIP (Index of Industrial Production) indicates that the growth rate in the capital goods industry declined to 1.8% from 5.9% . The fiat paper currency inflated figures of economic growth rate are decelerating, which has prompted the usual policy response from the government and its central bank officials. The usual response about which I am talking about is: Inflationism. Government and their central bank cronies know only to print money to cure any crisis, which, most importantly, they themselves have created in the first place! Yesterday RBI announced a reversal of their so-called anti-inflation policy stance and reduced the CRR (Cash Reserve Ratio). RBI governor said that, there focus has now shifted to economic growth from inflation. The fact of the matter is, that the focus of government and its monetary authority is always on inflation. Not for a second they stop cr...

Indian parliament passed the so-called anti-corruption Lokpal Bill, but that bill failed to pass in the assembly. People saw the crazy politicians' fighting and tearing the Lokpal Bill in the assembly. Anna Hazare is now in hospital and doctors have advised him not to go on fasting anymore. Despite this political drama, Indian population still believes that passing of such so-called anti-corruption bills will end the corruption. Nothing could be farther from the truth. As I have repeatedly said time and again, the root of corruption lies in the system of government interventionism in the market economy, and it cannot be rooted out without removing those interventions. Without dismantling the bureaucracies and ministries, it is impossible to remove political corruption. Recently I am reading Ludwig von Mises's wonderful little book, A Critique of Interventionism . While discussing the harmful effects of government intervention in the economy via direct restriction on product...

Prof. Kaushik Basu - who apart from being a professor of economics at the Cornell University, USA, is currently the chief economic adviser of the Ministry of Finance, Government of India - recently published a paper titled " Understanding Inflation and Controlling It " in the journal Economic and Political Weekly (EPW) , which is a well known journal in India published from Mumbai. Since inflation is the grave problem being faced by any economy and because Prof. Basu is the chief economic adviser of the Indian government, I decided to read the article to know his economic views, especially re inflation. It is important to know what the chief economist of Indian government has to say about Inflation. Knowing his views is important because billions of common man's lives depend on this one person's economic views. If his economic views are erroneous then our lives are in a big danger. If his understanding of inflation is faulty then we all are doomed. And as it tur...

Inflation is killing the common man and the Indian government and RBI is hell bent on debasing the currency. This debasement is a type of inflation which government is taking resort to to finance its boondoggles. The evidences of this inflation which I am presenting here are of Indian currency coins. The pictures clearly reveal the deteriorating quality of these coins because of government debasement. Since years they are doing this, but recently the speed of debasement has increased rapidly. So without any further delay I present the evidences. The first picture presents 1 rupee coins. First 1 rupee coin (all coins described from the left hand side) is from year 1998. This coin had at least some fine print work. When you compare it with others, you can at least say that it is bit heavy and had better print work on it. Next coin is of year 2000. Next to that is year 2008 coin. Just in 10 years time the 1 rupee coin has lost all its quality of weight and fine print. This coin is very ...