The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has approved a 23-month, US $7.6 billion loan to Pakistan in November to avert a severe current accounts deficit and Pakistan's debt default. On November 27, the IMF released to Islamabad a first installment of $3.1 billion, in it first "bailout" of an Asian country during the current world financial crisis.
Prior to this news, Pakistan's President Asif Ali Zardari knocked on many doors and begged unsuccessfully for billions of dollars in assistance for months from "Friends of Pakistan" (FOP), a group of countries including China, Saudi Arabia and the United States. This was part of an effort by Pakistan's new president to avoid going to the International Monetary Fund (IMF).
Why did the FOP decline to help? Why was Mr. Zardari trying to avoid an IMF bailout? Let's try and examine the answers to these two important questions being asked.
Friends of Pakistan:
Being friends, the FOP know a lot about Pakistan and Mr. Zardari. They have been watching Pakistani economy's return to the bad old days. While each of the friends genuinely wants to help in stabilizing Pakistan's economy, they have major concerns about the need for transparency and fiscal discipline before committing their money to help their friend. Given Mr. Zardari's reputation as Mr. Ten Percent, they are reluctant to write checks with no strings attached. In other words, they want to trust but verify, an objective that seems achievable if the IMF is involved in closely supervising Pakistan's budget, spending and economy.
Avoiding IMF:
Mr. Zardari has tried to avoid borrowing from the IMF for several reasons. For example, he does not want any one watching over his shoulders as he transacts business as usual. Another reason is that the IMF imposes tough conditions and budgetary restrictions that are usually unpopular and hurt the democratic government's chances of staying in power. The IMF makes the system of political patronage in a feudal society more difficult, if not impossible. Pakistanis have bitter memories of the IMF austerity programs implemented by the PPP and Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz) governments in the late 1980s and 1990s. Fearing a hostile public reaction and not wanting to accept a further loss of Pakistani "sovereignty" under conditions where the US is routinely carrying out military operations within Pakistan, the PPP-led government long hesitated in seeking a loan from the IMF. Earlier, President Musharraf's government had ended Pakistan's dependence on IMF by economic reforms that created confidence in Pakistan's economy and brought significant foreign investments to Pakistan. That confidence has disappeared after Musharraf's departure from the scene.
IMF's Tough Conditions:
1. Pakistan's central bank must tighten money supply. In order to pave the way for the IMF loan, Pakistan's central bank raised its bank lending rate in early November by 2 percentage points to 15 percent and the state bank has let it be known that a further 1.5 percentage point hike will be implemented in January. The justification for such high interest rates is the high inflation rate in excess of 20% in Pakistan, mainly due to high food and energy prices. Removal of subsidies is making it worse, in spite of declining world oil prices. Tighter money supply will almost certainly hurt businesses, consumers and overall employment, forcing a major recession. According to an Asia Times Online report, Anjum Nisar, the president of the Karachi Chamber of Commerce and Industry, has said, "Pakistan's industrial landscape may soon be marked with dead and sick units and there will be massive unemployment because of the devastating impact on businesses of the higher cost of bank loans arising from the interest rate increase." The liquidity crunch resulting from IMF's tough conditions will turn the already precarious situation of Pakistan's poor daily wage earners into a disaster. Increase in hunger and poverty will hurt Pakistani government's ability to fight Islamist insurgency and maintain peace and stability.
2. Pakistan government must cut spending and raise taxes. The IMF economic stabilization package calls for the government's annual budget deficit to "be reduced from 7.4 percent of GDP in 2007/2008 (July-June) to 4.2 percent in 2008/2009 and 3.3 percent in 2009/2010." The IMF added, "This fiscal adjustment will be achieved primarily by phasing out energy subsidies, better prioritizing development spending, and implementing strong tax policy and administration measures." This condition will also lead to a deep and prolonged recession in Pakistan.
3. The IMF wants Pakistan to raise tax revenue from the present 10 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) to 15 percent by 2013. Neighboring India's total tax revenue, including levies on income, imports and sales, also amounts to less than 10 percent of GDP now. In China, the figure is 20 percent, and among the members of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development it averaged 37 percent in 2001. As part of a plan to increase tax revenue, the IMF is pressing Pakistan for the introduction of a tax on agricultural income. Pakistan's large landowners have tenaciously resisted such proposals in the past. Should Islamabad ultimately impose a tax on agricultural income, it will only be after a bitter struggle within the Pakistani feudal ruling class over how to design it to be regressive to make small producers bear a disproportionate share of the tax burden.
4. IMF does not require defense spending cuts, further exacerbating the economic impact on ordinary citizens. The IMF, which is controlled by the US and other western powers, made no demands for cuts to Pakistan's massive military budget. Juan Carlos Di Tata, IMF senior special adviser for the Middle East and Central Asia, expressed concern about the rise in Pakistan's defense spending, but then added that the question of Pakistan's military expenditure had been excluded from the bank's negotiations with the country's Pakistan People's Party-led coalition government. "The issue of defense spending was not discussed during the program negotiations," said Di Tata. "Defense spending is basically an item that was determined by the government and included in the budget projections for this fiscal year. There was no discussion of this topic."
What's Next:
According to the IMF, even after last month's IMF loan, Pakistan will need another $20 billion "to get control over its imbalances." The FOP are scheduled to meet January 13-16 to decide on additional non-IMF assistance to Pakistan. Most likely, they will want IMF to continue supervising Pakistan's economy as a condition for their assistance.
While the US economic revival is planned with multiple stimulus packages, near-zero interest rates and tax cuts to increase liquidity for government, business and consumer spending, it seems the IMF prescription for Pakistan is quite the reverse. It is a basic economic fact that raising taxes does not increase revenue during a slowdown. Rather than close the budget gap, attempts to raise revenue cause a downward economic spiral. Instead of softening the impact on businesses and consumers, the austerity measures will clearly hurt the average and poor Pakistanis disproportionately and cause a great deal of suffering leading to greater political instability in the country. An unstable Pakistan is in no one's interest. But,what is good for the goose is apparently not good for the gander, according to the IMF's perverse logic.
16 comments:
All of IMF's conditions are in its own interest, i.e., to get the money back. So, no surprise on that front.
Unfortunately, the IMF's unreasonable conditions will make it more difficult to revive Pak economy. IMF's recipes usually make recipient nations deadbeat and dependent on more handouts from IMF and World Bank.
It's an illusion that IMF does "good" to an economy. IMF, like all other lender institutions, serves only its purpose and does no charity. Whether Pakistan can align itself to the causes of IMF, is what needs to be seen.
I agree, IMF does no good to any economy. From an Indian point of view, I feel that Pakistan's first priority should be to revive its economy & attract foreign investors. Open your economy towards free markets. And you need to work towards being a 'safer' country. That will bring in more investors. Yor second challenge should be Taliban. India & Kashmir should take a low priority as we do not threaten your existense. but your faltering economy & Taliban do.
Here's a Dawn story about the duplicity of Pakistan's "democratic leaders" published Jan 16, 2009:
ISLAMABAD: While publicly it criticizes former President Musharraf for the present economic mess, the government in its official documents has appreciated the economic policies of the previous regime that became a strong base for seeking loans from multilateral donors and friends of Pakistan.
The PPP-led coalition partners have been blaming Musharraf regime in public speeches for fudging economic figures to paint a rosy picture, while its overall policies pushed the country into economic crisis.
The letter of intent (LoI), on the basis of which, Pakistan sought the much-needed $7.6 billion bailout package from the International Monitory Fund (IMF), has bit by bit appreciated the Musharraf policies since 2000.
During the past one decade (1999-2007), the LoI says Pakistan’s economy witnessed a major economic transformation from substantial increase in the volume of gross domestic product (GDP) to greater international trade.
Talking to Dawn on Thursday former Finance Minister Ishaq Dar said whatever he said about the health of economy was based on the balance sheet existed on March 31, 2008. He said the balance sheet was dully approved by the then cabinet headed by Prime Minister Syed Yousuf Raza Gilani.
He said no body denied the contents of the balance sheet. The focus of the previous economic policy was on promotion of consumerism without supporting the industrial base.
Apparently not willing to agree with the LoI contents, he said though he has a different view of the past economic growth but quickly added the same was destroyed in the last 15 months of the military led dictator.
An official source requesting not to be named said the economic wizards in the finance ministry are not politicians to make only speeches but they have to look into ground realities. ‘We reported to IMF whatever is factual and based on evidence,’ the official added.
The LoI said the country’s real GDP increased from $60 billion in 2000-01 to $170 billion in 2007-08 with per capital income rising from under $500 to over $1000. During the same period, the volume of international trade increased to nearly $60 billion from $20 billion.
For most of this period, real GDP grew at more than 7 per cent a year with relative price stability. The improved macroeconomic performance enabled Pakistan to re-enter the international capital markets in the mid-2000s. Buoyant output growth, low inflation, and the government’s social policies contributed to a reduction in poverty and an improvement in many social indicators.
Former Finance Minister Dr Salman Shah told this scribe the government has made the 170 million people fool while telling them pack of lies in the past nine months about the economic policies of the Mushrraf regime.
He said that as the present government acknowledged in black and white, the impressive past growth made their way easier to make access to the new facility of the IMF for emerging markets hit by the crisis to support the balance of payment problems.
Had growth not been achieved, Pakistan would have to apply for other long term IMF financing facilities like poverty reduction, structural adjustments etc, Shah said adding government should tell truth to the nation if they have confidence.
‘The recruitment made so far for running the finances of this country is very depressing. This shows this government has neither commitment nor capabilities to take the country out of the current crisis,’ Dr Salman said.
Here's a report from The News about Pakistan's growing debt.
Tuesday, March 30, 2010
KARACHI: Pakistan’s debt sustainability indicators deteriorated in July-Dec 2009 as external debt and liabilities were up, while foreign exchange earnings remained stagnant and the economy slowed down, the SBP said in its report.
The total external debt as percentage of GDP as well as debt servicing to export earnings ratio worsened during the period under review, the bank said. The stock of external debt and liabilities increased by $4.7 billion to reach $55.8 billion in the first half of the current fiscal year, it said.
External debt servicing was $2.648 billion by end of Dec 2009, up 9.7 per cent from the same period of the previous year, as the country repaid bilateral creditors, multilateral donors and private non-guaranteed debt. Yet, almost 25 per cent the increase in external debt and liabilities was due to depreciation of the US dollar against major currencies, the SBP in its report said.
With $180 billion GDP, Pakistan's debt to gdp ratio is about about 30%.
While I agree that it can become a serious problem if not properly tackled, I also think it can be managed if the economy starts to grow again soon. That's the real challenge for Pakistan right now.
In rural Pakistan where about 70% of Pakistanis live, people spend 55% of their income on food, according to a World Resources Institute (WRI) report.
The bottom two BOP (Bottom of Income Pyramid) groups alone account for more than 50% of national food spending in Pakistan. Average annual food spending per household in the BOP in Pakistan is $2,643. While BOP3000 households have 6 times as much income on average, they outspend BOP500 households in the food market by a ratio of only 2:1 in Cameroon, 2.3:1 in South Africa and Pakistan, 2.4:1 in Kazakhstan, 1.9:1 in Uzbekistan, and 3:1 in Peru.
Currently, food inflation in Pakistan is running at 15.49 percent, hitting the poor the hardest.
According to a recent Daily Times report, Non-perishable food item prices increased 14.76 percent whereas perishable food items recorded 21.30 percent increase in their prices.
Fuel & lighting index rose 20.19 percent during January this over the last year whereas house rent index posted 13.38 increase this month.
Transport & communication index rose 9.43 percent, education expenses increased 13.68 percent and medical expenses increased 5.88 percent.
The detailed analysis of the SPI prices for Jan-10 reveals that few items, within the food category, were observed to post over 100bps MoM increase in prices. Sugar (1.92 percent weight in the CPI) remained exceptional with 19 percent MoM increase and food prices (40.3 percent weight in the CPI) contributed passively this time around to the CPI in Jan-10 due to being relatively stable.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2011/jan/17/imf-health-aid-millennium-development-goals
Poor countries with IMF loans 'divert aid from public health'
Oxford University-led research finds signs that tough loan conditions imposed by IMF has led to health aid being diverted for other uses
Here are some excerpts from an Op Ed in Newsweek Pakistan by Meekal Ahmed, a former IMF official:
The government hopes to generate Rs. 53 billion during the last quarter of the current financial year, which concludes on June 30. It hopes to achieve this by imposing a 15 percent surcharge on income tax paid by Pakistan’s paltry 1.7 million registered, individual taxpayers. Given the small tax base and modest yield, the surcharge seems unfair and not worth it. In a move that is regressive and potentially inflationary, depending on the market, excise duty on certain import items has been increased from 1 percent to 2.5 percent until end-June. While these measures are better than doing nothing at all—which is what happened during the first three quarters—they are far from ideal, and don’t go far enough to address the big problems with the economy.
But it’s not all bad. The elimination of tax exemptions for agricultural inputs (including tractors, fertilizers, and pesticides) was long overdue. With a strong agro-lobby preventing taxation on their handsome incomes in a sector that contributes 21 percent of GDP, the government might as well tax the inputs. Tax exemptions for export quality textiles sold within Pakistan have also been nixed despite resistance from the fierce textile lobby. The freeze on additional hiring in the public sector, and the 50 percent cut in several spending categories should also be welcomed.
Then there is the profusion of what many Pakistani media outlets call “petrol bombs”—highly unpopular oil price adjustments at the start of each month. The government announces the adjustments, and then rolls them back under popular and political pressure. The fuel price adjustments are unavoidable. Pakistan is a net oil importer and can’t insulate itself from global price shocks. Oil prices have risen steeply in the last three months, and have now crossed the psychologically important 100-dollar mark. Pakistan’s fuel subsidies—at an estimated Rs. 5 billion per month that could have been spent on development—are unaffordable and unsustainable. Oil prices will remain high for a while. Pakistanis must adjust to this reality. .....
...
Despite the new measures, doubts remain about the revised tax-revenue targets and the state’s capacity to achieve them. The Federal Board of Revenue is notorious for its chronic underperformance. The justification that there is a tax revenue shortfall because the economy is in recession holds no water. An economy expected to grow at around 3 percent is not, technically speaking, in recession, but is growing below its potential. There is no cycle for fiscal revenues in Pakistan: whether the economy grows at 3 percent or 7 percent, whether inflation is 2 percent or 25 percent, tax revenues fail to keep up. If they did not, there would be a constant tax-to-GDP ratio, which is actually falling. This trend points to the existence of deep-rooted structural deficiencies in the tax system, which is regressive, anti-poor and plagued by too many exemptions and concessions. Then there’s also corruption, abuse of the system, and evasion. Even taxes withheld at source are not deposited in the government’s account because of alleged connivance between withholding agents and tax officials.
Here's an AFP report on Pakistani tax dodgers:
ISLAMABAD — Pakistan is defying mounting Western pressure to end a giant tax dodge with fewer and fewer people contributing to government coffers, spelling dire consequences for a sagging economy.
Tax is taboo in Pakistan. Barely one percent of the population pays at all, as a corrupt bureaucracy safeguards entrenched interests and guards private wealth, but starves energy, health and education of desperately needed funds.
Less than 10 percent of GDP comes from tax revenue -- one of the lowest global rates and worse than in much of Africa, say economists.
Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) spokesman Asrar Rauf said 1.9 million people paid tax in 2010, less than the year before, despite 3.2 million being registered to pay -- itself a drop in the ocean of a population of 180 million.
As a result, Pakistan's fiscal deficit widened from 5.3 percent to 6.3 percent of GDP in 2010, the Asian Development Bank said this month, knocking 2011 growth figures to 2.5 percent and predictions for 2012 to 3.2 percent.
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This month visiting British Prime Minister David Cameron pressed the point home, saying aid increases were a hard sell when: "Too many of your richest people are getting away without paying much tax at all and that's not fair".
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The IMF last May halted a $11.3 billion assistance package over a lack of progress on reforms, principally on tax.
And despite a flurry of meetings, no new loan has been agreed in the run-up to the IMF and World Bank's Spring meetings.
An IMF review mission is due to visit on May 8. "Consensus is building, we have almost reached agreement (on reform)," one government official told AFP, but gave no details.
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What would really work, say analysts, would be scrapping exemptions that serve entrenched interests, such as a 50 percent tax discount on sugar and a gate on taxing agricultural income that largely exempts wealthy feudal landowners.
But stalemate and vested interests have made that impossible.
"There's talk of early elections. One has a brittle coalition. A lot of the reform areas that need to be dealt with have very well entrenched and powerful lobbies that are making the case against it," said a finance ministry official.
As it is, the tiny minority who contribute say they carry a disproportionate tax burden, for which they get nothing in return.
Pakistan suffers from an awful energy crisis, yet government spending on electricity subsidies last year reached just under one percent of GDP, health spending 0.5 percent and education two percent, said the finance ministry.
According to a 2009 study by the Pakistan Institute of Legislative Development and Transparency, the average member of parliament was worth $900,000 and the wealthiest $37 million.
Those figures stand against estimates that a quarter of the population lives below the poverty line and that GDP per capita stands at $2,400.
"No one trusts the government," says industrialist Mohammad Ishaq, former vice president of the chamber of commerce in the northwestern province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.
"Without social welfare and with this corruption, nobody is ready to pay tax... in return one gets nothing -- no health, education, social security."
Eunuchs have been appointed tax collectors in Karachi, the financial capital, on the understanding that a visit from the maligned transgender group would embarrass people into paying up.
But former finance minister Salman Shah said tax evasion was inevitable because of corruption within the FBR, which employs 23,000 people nationwide.
"There's a big mistrust of the tax authority itself. That's why a self-assessment scheme came in," said Shah.
.............
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2011/08/18/the_road_to_tahrir
The Road to Tahrir
The roots of Egyptians' rage can be traced back to bad economic advice from the IMF -- and the crony capitalism it left behind.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/global-development/poverty-matters/2010/nov/24/washington-consensus
We've yet to kill off the Washington consensus
The Washington consensus is alive and well and will continue to be so unless we lobby our governments to stop pushing the failed policies of the World Bank and the IMF, argues Rick Rowden
Pakistan to end IMF program, reports Dawn:
..The government’s inability to implement three major economic policy commitments — limiting fiscal deficit to 4.7 per cent of GDP, introducing integrated value added tax (VAT) and power sector reforms — will lead to technical completion of an unsuccessful $11.3 billion programme with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) on September 30, according to Finance Minister Dr Abdul Hafeez Shaikh.
This is the eighth programme with the IMF to conclude on an unsuccessful note. On the eve of the departure of Pakistan’s economic team for Washington to attend annual meetings of the IMF and World Bank, the finance minister told journalists that Pakistan would not waste its energy on revival of the incomplete programme or seek a fresh programme owing to a comfortable external balance of payments position.
He, however, said the government would stay on course on power sector reforms and macroeconomic adjustment and stabilisation programme and take steps so that it has reasonable credibility to return to the IMF programme with ease in case of any difficulty with external account.
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Officials said the government might have to increase electricity tariff by 10-12 per cent if it succeeded in pushing forward the power sector reforms to reduce subsidies. The Deputy Chairman of the Planning Commission, Dr Nadeem ul Haque, said he could not even imagine the quantum of tariff increase required to be introduced in case reforms failed to progress because the power sector’s financing gap stood at about Rs250 billion this year.
Officials said the government had committed to the IMF to contain the fiscal deficit below 4.7 per cent of the GDP after the last year’s floods, which was later revised to 5.3 per cent of the GDP. However, the government could not meet even the revised fiscal deficit limit which officially exceeded 5.9 per cent at the end of the financial year on June 30 this year.
The government also could not introduce the value added tax in an integrated form and then it could not show a good performance on power sector reforms which also contributed to higher than anticipated fiscal deficit.
The official said both the government and the IMF understood that spending energy on revival of existing programme for a couple of billions of dollars were of no use.
The government’s comfortable feeling stems from anticipated $37 billion earnings from a five per cent growth in exports and strong workers’ remittances during the current fiscal year, enough to meet the country’s foreign exchange requirements with a current account deficit of about 1-2 per cent.
The officials said the government would have to repay $1.2 billion to IMF during the current year in two instalments and it estimated a gap of $500 million to a maximum of $2 billion during the year.
The finance minister tried to explain how the government could remain fiscally responsible in the absence of an IMF programme when elections were fast nearing. Reminded that the previous government had given up the IMF programme prematurely which later led to a freezing of power tariffs and build-up of oil-related subsidies and that the current government was also following the same path ahead of elections to leave a poor economy for the next government, the minister said elections were never discussed in any official meeting.
http://www.dawn.com/2011/09/17/pakistan-to-end-imf-programme.html
Here's a Businessweek report on IMF's assessment of Pakistan's economy:
Pakistan faces a “challenging” economic outlook and should seek to contain its deficit while adopting a cautious monetary policy, the International Monetary Fund said after an annual review of the country’s policies.
Economic growth is expected to reach about 3.5 percent for the fiscal year started July 1 and inflation is forecast to slow down, the Washington-based IMF said in a press release today.
Still, “the external current account balance is projected to return to a deficit, and global risk aversion and security concerns may limit capital inflows,” the IMF mission said. Beyond fiscal and monetary policies, “a responsive exchange rate would reduce vulnerabilities, contain inflation and protect Pakistan’s international reserve,” the fund said.
An $11.3 billion loan program to Pakistan expired in September with no payments disbursed since May 2010 because the country didn’t meet the conditions attached to it.
The IMF mission and Pakistani authorities, who met in Dubai and Islamabad Nov. 9-19, also discussed policies for the medium term, including changes to the tax system and in the energy sector.
A detailed report of Pakistan’s economy will be examined by the IMF board in late January, the mission said.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-11-22/pakistan-faces-challenging-outlook-may-grow-3-5-imf-says.html#
Here is the "all over the place" news that is typical of our GOP's dealings with the IMF:
(1) IMF Praises Pakistan for Prompt Repayment
http://alturl.com/kbvxx
(2) GOP wants IMF to defer Repayments
http://alturl.com/vptpw
(3) GOP not thinking of asking for more IMF help.
http://alturl.com/2knwv
(4) GOP may seek fresh IMF help.
http://alturl.com/n4m32
Well? Which is it? They can't all be true at the same time, can they?
Muddled. Confused.
^^RH: "The IMF wants Pakistan to raise tax revenue from the present 10 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) to 15 percent by 2013. Neighboring India's total tax revenue, including levies on income, imports and sales, also amounts to less than 10 percent of GDP now."
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I agree that our Tax/GDP ratio is less than 10%.
http://www.tradingeconomics.com/pakistan/tax-revenue-percent-of-gdp-wb-data.html
But I disagree that India's Tax/GDP ratio is also as low as ours.
http://www.tradingeconomics.com/india/tax-revenue-percent-of-gdp-wb-data.html
The reason is that India has very different tax structure.
We have a federal-only tax structure. India has a (60-10):(40+10) federal to state tax structure.
http://www.rbi.org.in/home.aspx
In other words, their central government collects 60% of all taxes and returns 10% to the states, retaining 50% of all taxes for itself. Their individual states collect 40% of all taxes and get the 10% that was transferred from the center.
So if the WB data, which always refer to central government, show India's tax revenue as 10% of GDP, it means that India's total tax revenue is 16.7% of GDP.
In our case, however, the "subahs" do not collect much (if any) taxes and the collection is still along Ayub's "One Unit" system. So when our WB data show that our tax revenue is 9% of GDP, then that is really all our tax revenue approximately is.
The IMF/WB know this. That is why they are always breathing down our neck for reform and do not say much to India.
Please correct yourself in the future.
Here's an interesting Op Ed by Mazur Ejaz in Friday Times:
The condition of an economy is often confused with the financial health of its government. Pakistan's economy is perceived to be in a deep hole because of its near-bankrupt fiscal conditions. Similarly, America's inability to settle on a national budget is taken to be an indicator of the collapse of the US Empire.
In some ways, the condition of the economy and the financial health of the government are separate matters. Major stock market indexes at Karachi Stock Exchange and the Wall Street are at their highest level, but both governments are facing serious financial problems. Most of the countries around the world are facing similar dichotomous situations. So how does one solve the riddle of the corporate sector making record profits while governments around the world are in serious financial jeopardy?
The phenomenon needs to be analyzed at grass-roots level. A shopkeeper from my village comes to mind. He told me that he sells PTCL internet cards grossing about Rs 9,000 every day. There are several other such shops in the village. That means that just in one village, the total sale of PTCL internet cards is up to 50,000 rupees. This consumer item was not present five years ago, which means hundreds of computers have been bought in the village recently. Furthermore, if such luxury products are making such huge profits for village shops, traders throughout the country must be making much larger profits selling essentials every day. One of the indicators of booming business in our village is that the United Bank branch in the village is doing very well, according to its manager.
There are thousands of such villages in the country, and that gives one an idea of the mammoth growth of rural markets. Such an undocumented economy is not even factored in estimating the economic growth of the country. From these supposedly marginal markets, one can extrapolate the profits of the corporate sector in towns and cities.
It may be astounding for some that Pakistan's banking sector is considered fourth in profitability in the entire world. Producers of other major industrial and agricultural products are also making huge profits. Cement, fertilizer, automobile, construction and telecommunication industries are doing extremely well. Other than the textile industry, which has been hit by power shortages, there is hardly any manufacturer or importer/exporter of any kind of goods who is not making money. The stock markets look at the profits of these industries and price them accordingly. Therefore the claims of Pakistan's economic growth are not a fairy tale. The evidence is out there in the market.
The government is also like a large corporation whose income depends mainly on tax revenue. Most of the goods and services (such as roads, defense, education and health) provided by the government are public goods which are not priced directly. The government has to price its public goods through direct taxes on income and sales, or indirectly. Following a certain brand of capitalism, countries like Pakistan and the US are not collecting enough taxes to cover the cost of public goods. They have failed mainly in collecting direct taxes on income. While Pakistan cannot implement an appropriate tax collection mechanism because of corruption, the US has leaned towards favoring high income groups and ended up in a jam. The net result is the same: the rich are getting richer, appropriating most of the new wealth generated....
http://www.thefridaytimes.com/beta3/tft/article.php?issue=20130322&page=9
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