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Showing posts from March, 2021

China and the Time Warp

- March 31, 2021

China has fascinated the West for a very long time. They have been inquisitive about the way China has gone about in it thousands of years of history. Partly because China has been secretive, in part the curiosity has been about China’s handling of its relations overseas, its expeditions, its kingdoms in the Middle to Late Age, the Forbidden City and of course its Communist Revolution and post Maoist period. China was largely forbidden to the West for many years. For many years, China played a role of contented kingdom which had everything to satisfy the needs. The only things it needed perhaps was those goods which had certain snob or entertainment value. In the Middle to Late Middle Ages, it projected itself as something interested in Veblen imports and not something routine. In the Maoist period, the revolutionary impact made it forbidden to the rest. China was perhaps not colonized the way India for instance, yet there were many regions in China that were under Western control at

Academic Research and Policy Interventions

- March 30, 2021

At least in terms of perception, there seems to be disconnect between public policy and academic research. Research is something sound, yet it has little application more often than not in terms of policy prescriptions. What might work as good policy measure might actually turn out to be bad research from a methodological point of view. There are occasion when there is some interesting research findings have emerged, yet when implemented in policy have turned out to be very bad choices. There is an interesting discussion on the same on Freakonomics . The talk highlights the gap between the research objectives and the policy instruments and objectives. Research, in academic parlance is all about methodology. The journals would go at length to enquire on the methodological approaches. Their interest in findings are an outcome of methodology adopted rather than the outcomes themselves. The absence of rigor in research is a disqualification. For instance, if a firm has experienced

The Hand of Finance in the Digital Business Models

- March 29, 2021

The business landscape keeps changing. The only constant perhaps in business would be change. Therefore, there would be a pressing need to re-haul the business models to accommodate the changing environment. As the brick and mortar economy gives way to the digital economy, the firms have to constantly innovate. The firms are configured for a certain topography and when faced with an unfamiliar configuration of assets and resources, they struggle. This perhaps could be a critical point in understanding why very few firms survive for more than half a century. There would be hardly a handful of firms which might record double digit year on year growth over let us say five consecutive years. The landscape that has been predominating over the last couple of decades is something interesting. There is an increase in research and development costs. It is a different story that the returns continue to sub-par with respect to the expenditure on research and development. Yet in the absenc

Of Economics, Right and Left

- March 28, 2021

In recent days, there was news that Amazon is forcing its employees, especially the delivery team to urinate in bottles so as to save time. This is something that has come to be associated with what is wrong with capitalism and its variants and mutations. What Amazon seems to have done is nothing unusual if one goes by past precedents? There are countless stories of excesses by the capitalist enterprises in terms of their treatment of the employees. Instances from China highlight how poor conditions haunt the workers who assemble a Nike shoe to an Apple iPhone. They work in conditions that are pathetic and little time is given even for meeting their biological requirements. Instances of pregnant women being harassed and dismissed in factories from China to Sri Lanka to the Central America to avoid meeting maternity leaves and similar perks too have been well documented. The sweatshops as these get branded have been considered by a school of thought as something unavoidable evil in th

Studying the Knowledge Economy

- March 27, 2021

On April 30, 1993, the WWW became open to public. So the era in the human society could very well be defined before the www era and the www era. The vision of Tim Berners Lee came to fruition on this day. He had visualized the interconnectivity among systems in the early 1980s which came to become the internet in 1989 at CERN. While the first website might have come around in 1991 or so, it was in 1993, the access was open to the public. It heralded into a revolution few could have imagined. As the world entered 1990s, it was believed computers would be here to stay but more of a standalone systems or at the most local area connected networks. The concept of wide area networks would again be a private or rather a club good. In the years following 1993, the expansion of the internet was beyond the expectations of its most ardent advocates. As information or even before it, the data began to pile up, it had become virtually difficult to search for something one needed in the internet.

Reviewing Inflation Targeting

- March 25, 2021

In 2016, India officially adopted inflation targeting as the objective of the monetary policy. With five years elapsed since the Urijit Patel committee submitted its report and later adopted, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) is all set to review the policy. The committee headed by Urijit Patel had suggested 4% as the targeted inflation with of course a permitted band of plus or minus two percent. In other words, the RBI policy would have to ensure the inflation remains within the range of 2-6%. The repo rate was made the benchmark interest rate around which the RBI stance would revolve. Based on the data and evidence, it was believed that 1.25% would be the ideal real repo rate. In other words, at this real repo rate, the economy grow at a level it would have grown if there was full employment. This was something akin to what Philips Curve would have projected around. The four percent inflation mark was perhaps viewed in the Philips Curve terminology as non-accelerating inflation ra

Election Season 2021: A Note

- March 24, 2021

The very geography of India makes it a permanent election season. There are elections round the clock in some or the other part of the country. There are elections to the Parliament, there are elections to the state assemblies. There are bye-elections to the Parliament or State Assemblies. There are elections to local bodies, autonomous councils or what not. Therefore, there is valid reason why the current government is keen on having ‘One Nation, One Election’. It is not just the costs, but the productivity lost in the election season and the perennial Model Code of Conduct in some part of the country or the other. As with any year, 2021 too has its own set of elections. Therefore, one is all set for the election season which is beginning the current week in West Bengal and Assam and will also cover the states of Kerala, Tamil Nadu and the Union Territory of Pondicherry. Besides, there are by-elections scheduled both for Lok Sabha and the Vidhan Sabha across the different states and

Of Freedom of Expression and Ripper Jeans

- March 19, 2021

The freedom of expression is a sine qua non in a democracy would be an understatement. It is not just important to have your say but allow the right to disagree without recourse to violence. There are myriad points of view and it is the societal welfare that would be best served when these points of view are allowed to be expressed without fear. Natan Sharansky, a conservative thinker once proposed a town square test. It implied the real freedom would exist when someone could go into the town square and express his or her views without fearing for their life or liberty. India has recognized the freedom of speech as an integral part of the constitution by enshrining it among the fundamental rights. The courts too have upheld the right to free speech and expression many a times in their judgments. Yet, what has not gone unnoticed is the right of free expression is selectively applied. Perhaps it is only one ideology that seems to have a monopoly over free expression. This again has bee

President Biden's Challenges

- March 18, 2021

As President Biden took office a couple of months ago, conservative historian Niall Fergusson wrote an interesting piece juxtaposing the challenges President Biden might face in the coming months and years. The article is available here . The challenges range from China to Chinese virus to crime to racial divide in a country deeply torn by divisions. To add, would be his age- he is already the oldest to occupy the White House for the first time- apart from his health concerns. President Biden was favored by the establishment as the socialist Bernie Sanders threatened to run away with the Democrat nomination. The choice of Biden was also dictated perhaps by the fact he was the least unacceptable among the contenders. His term as Vice President during Obama administration cemented his credentials. Yet as he assumed office, US is certainly not in the best of the times. There are some scholars who are already talking about the Soviet days during Gorbachev. There are enough obituaries ab

Quad Summit: A New Triple Entente?

- March 17, 2021

A few days ago, the Quad hosted the first summit at the leadership level. The Quad has been an informal grouping of four countries having stakes in Indo-Pacific region. These countries are United States, Japan, Australia and India. The groundwork for Quad grouping had begun quite earlier, yet for a fairly long period of time in the last decade, the moves were tentative. The exercises planned for navy and other armed forces did hit roadblocks since Australia backtracked ostensibly under the Chinese pressure. It was only in the last five or six years that Quad has got a fresh lease of life. Under Donald Trump, the United States moved into a sort of confrontation from a denial with China. As the move gathered speed to counter China, the Quad became a tool. India too has been seeking to build up some counter though officially denied towards China. Interestingly of the Quad countries, it is only India that shares land borders with China and has had a long standing conflict with it. India

Oil Price Conundrum and India

- March 15, 2021

The fuel prices in India seems to be heading northwards with little signs of reversal. They have touched historical highs in recent times. The cascading effect of fuel price rise on other goods would in all probability ensure inflation is headed northwards. As inflation would breach the 6% benchmark, the outcome would obviously be a tightening of the interest rates. This is something that India would want last thing to happen. As the demand picks up albeit with uncertainty of fresh spurt in COVID cases, there in all likelihood will see an increased demand for fuel. The prices are likely to go up given the cut in production across the Middle East. While India has sought to diversify its oil sources, the region continues to depend heavily on the Middle East. The Saudis and their oil counterpart countries do not seem to be in a mood to increase the production. To add, the crisis in Yemen, an offshoot of which has been constant attack on oil fields in Saudi Arabia and UAE by the Yemeni r

The Historian's Trauma

- March 13, 2021

To an individual, getting embroiled in an experience that would be unsettling or traumatic would be of one that no one would wish to. Yet, in everyday life, there are professions wherein an individual would get into these experiences. To a policeperson, it would be an everyday affair perhaps to visit the crime scenes, investigate, and talk to those families all of which would perhaps be unsettling. It would be something similar to a doctor or a nurse attending medical emergencies on a daily basis. Something similar would exist for lawyers either as prosecutors or defence lawyers. Yet in many of these instances, the situations are not something you are prepared for. There is essentially a reaction to the events that unfold in front of the eyes. In the corona crisis, the events would unfold and there was very little the doctors or other health care workers could do. As jounralists report from different areas including war zones or terror zones, there is very little they could do as the

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