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Equity over efficiency: An Indian preference

Private commercial interest, Indians tend to believe, often trumps social interest

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T C A Srinivasa-Raghavan
A few days ago someone tweeted a 1977 Columbia lecture by Kenneth Arrow, who died last week, titled “A Cautious Case for Socialism”. The most important political economy point made by him in it was that capitalism was, or could be, inconsistent with democracy and freedom, while socialism wasn’t and couldn’t be. 

For a variety of reasons, he thought this was a superior alternative to American-style capitalism which, from time to time, allowed all resources to lie idle, causing great hardship to people. Political power also got concentrated in a very few hands.

Similar thoughts had occurred to India’s economic thinkers about
Disclaimer: These are personal views of the writer. They do not necessarily reflect the opinion of www.business-standard.com or the Business Standard newspaper

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