From Japan in the 1960s to China in the 2000s, many countries transformed their economies by using competitive exchange rates as part of their industrial strategies.
In January 1st week, India had forex reserves worth $633 bn, indicating a fall of over $82 billion so far. Forex depletion means RBI's been selling dollars to tackle falling rupee.
Contrary to naysayers, the RSS practices what it preaches. It is closer to the Gandhian teaching of improving the individual morally and spiritually to change the external environment.
This is the game every nation is now learning to play. Some are finding new allies or seeing value among nations where they’d seen marginal interest. The starkest example is India & Europe.
This is lazy thinking for people who don’t want to swallow bitter pill of reforms.
Petrol taxes by both Centre and State, make input costs high for MSMEs. And what is rhe tax money spent on?
Over procurement of rice from Punjab, and sugarcane from Vidarbha. Free electricity for water pumps, to grow these crops, comes by making it costly to factories. Subsidizing urea, that is being abused by farmers, making the farm saline.
Crop diversification to less water-intensive crops, would indirectly help MSMEs, by reducing their costs.
And all this is before we do labour reforms.
This is old world thinking. Cheap manufacturing drove industrialization 30-40 years back, today with robotics pure labor cost savings are not that important. Genuine innovation, value addition drives manufacturing today. Tanking the currency, will increase inflation, deflate FII confidence and hurt the economy.
Since college, have been reading that a weak currency is good for exports. How then does one reconcile the sluggishness in merchandise exports over the last decade, even as the Rupee has continued to sag.
The very same people who had problems with rupee between 50 and 60, are now advocating still more fall. (The question is not falling per se ,but the value of rupee at one stage indicates the efficiency of the Govt in utilizing/wasting/misdirecting the resources at hand). That clearly indicates lack of balance and direction.
This is lazy thinking for people who don’t want to swallow bitter pill of reforms.
Petrol taxes by both Centre and State, make input costs high for MSMEs. And what is rhe tax money spent on?
Over procurement of rice from Punjab, and sugarcane from Vidarbha. Free electricity for water pumps, to grow these crops, comes by making it costly to factories. Subsidizing urea, that is being abused by farmers, making the farm saline.
Crop diversification to less water-intensive crops, would indirectly help MSMEs, by reducing their costs.
And all this is before we do labour reforms.
This is old world thinking. Cheap manufacturing drove industrialization 30-40 years back, today with robotics pure labor cost savings are not that important. Genuine innovation, value addition drives manufacturing today. Tanking the currency, will increase inflation, deflate FII confidence and hurt the economy.
Since college, have been reading that a weak currency is good for exports. How then does one reconcile the sluggishness in merchandise exports over the last decade, even as the Rupee has continued to sag.
The very same people who had problems with rupee between 50 and 60, are now advocating still more fall. (The question is not falling per se ,but the value of rupee at one stage indicates the efficiency of the Govt in utilizing/wasting/misdirecting the resources at hand). That clearly indicates lack of balance and direction.