Ashok K Lahiri

Are welfare state and its agents, the political parties, making such excessive promises, particularly in pre-election years, with undesirable consequences?

In inflation-averse Indian polity, people complain about high inflation and high prices all the time. Thus, there may also be handsome electoral dividends from low inflation

Highly progressive taxes on income, wealth, and inheritance have been tried for long. They failed in producing the desired result

The Union government has withheld MNREGS and PMAY funds -two centrally sponsored schemes - because of procedural lapses, alleged corruption

At the end of March, its outstanding debt is expected to increase from about Rs 4.82 trillion in 2021 to about Rs 5.29 trillion in 2022 and further to a little more than Rs 5.86 trillion in 2023

Once the pandemic is over, the states need to garner more own revenues to spend more on meritorious heads such as education, health and infrastructure

Macroeconomic stability with low inflation has been achieved with policy perseverance. Throwing the gains away would not be judicious

The inflation enemy may have been weakened, but may be far from dead

Unfortunate if the GST regime comes with low rates and derails the fiscal consolidation reform

The Survey would be presented early this year, but taking it too seriously has its own risks

The recent demonetisation should be judged to have delivered some immediate gain if at least around Rs 2 trillion gets immobilised

The liquidity crunch may extend far beyond the calendar year. A quick way to remonetise would be to import currency notes

Initiating reforms that are work in progress is fairly common among countries, including India. Remember CENVAT?

The Indian economy can grow if it is delinked from the slow growth in the West and the deceleration in China

Is Japan likely to be the first economy to opt for distributing cash as a temporary fiscal stimulus, also known as helicopter money?

The likelihood of the divorce going through appears slim and may result in 'reconciliation during legal separation'

As Rodrigo Duterte is not from the traditional oligarchy, he may attempt real reform - but he will face formidable challenges

In 1967, Congress, rattled by a reduced majority in Parliament, decided to implement 'pro-people' socialist policies

To improve the efficiency of the logistics sector in India, road transportation has to become more efficient

Hard physical support for the logistics sector is included under infrastructure & eligible for preferential financial & tax treatment