India, Startups, and Economic Development

Jun 18, 2006

Some governements are pro-rich (e.g., US Republican). Some governments are pro-poor (e.g., the several state governments in India who publicly demonize the rich). They both fail. The pro-rich govts cut estate tax. The pro-poor govts cut income tax in the low income bracket. I think the most successful government would be pro–wanna-be-rich. I don’t see many governments like that. US govt (both Rep & Dem) is more pro–wanna-be-rich than most other. Results vouch for that. But not sufficiently so.

Pro–wanna-be-rich would make it easier to start companies and everything else that goes with that. I’m sure the Indian finance minister and the other elite realize this and intend to do something about this. But I wonder how long it will take for the people and the government “machinery” to differentiate between entrepreneurs and get-rich-quick crooks. I hope to live to see that day. The main obstacle I see for this change in attitude is the group of unscruplous businessmen who don’t even pay minimum wages to their employees. When will we have many startups in India?

It is good that no fortune lasts for more than three generations :-) You have to do it all by yourself from the scratch, without your daddy’s money - and thereby you will actively drive economic development by creating wealth.

Communism makes it impossible to make wealth (=bad). Capitalism continues to increase the barrier for entry (=bad). How will the world be if you just can’t inherit?

2 comments

maniosai wrote on Jun 22, 2006:

I think that the minimum wages is not the way in which business men are evil, they cannot be because paying less than minimum wages is only possible when there is high supply of labour and low demand for them. This will reverse (more demand for labour and less supply of the same) in a developing country at any point as it has happened now in India.

What bothers me more is the way in which people use the benefits and subsidies offered by the Govt to promote industries to make a quick buck. These self proclaimed entrepreuners start businesses not with their eye on the future but on the immediate benefits offered by the Govt and at times see this as the profit.

What i would propose is a VC-Govt or much better a For Profit Govt. Let the Govt make profits for the sake of all its investors ie the people of the country.

Mike wrote on Jun 22, 2006:

Thoughts to go w/today’s blog entry

Seems like if you step up and take initiative you get spanked because you shouldn’t have touched it. If you don’t, well, then you get spanked for not doing anything. Either way you cannot win. Corporations spout how employees need to think like entrepreneurs and be innovative but at the same time have created a hierarchy where that cannot happen.

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