More of the dismal same | The Indian Express

More of the dismal same | The Indian Express

Written by Prabhat Patnaik |Published: July 8, 2019 1:42:19 am

The writer is former professor of economics at JNU, Delhi.

More of the dismal same

The budget needed to break new ground, provide a thrust to a slowing economy. This budget lacks innovation.

The most obvious exogenous element that could have been introduced to break out of this pro-cyclicality is a wealth tax, at least on the billionaires of the country, whose wealth is estimated at present to be around Rs 560 lakh crore. (Illustration by Suvajit Dey)

Economics has never been a strong point of the NDA government. Its only two major economic forays, demonetisation and the GST, have both turned out to be pretty disastrous. It was futile, therefore, to expect much from the Union Budget for 2019-20. Even so, one is surprised by the budget’s lack of engagement with the current problems of the economy, which are serious: A slowing down of activity, agrarian distress, massive unemployment, and external payments worries exacerbated by Donald Trump’s belligerence.