View Sliding economy needs serious structural fixes

经济下滑需要进行严肃的结构性修正

When Narendra Modi was re-elected, optimists expected GDP growth to accelerate to 8%. Alas, it is plummeting towards 4%, having fallen steadily in the last four quarters — 7%, 6.8%, 5.6% and 5%.

Expect a further fall to almost 4% when the July-September figures come out. The Index of Industrial production was minus 4.3% in September, the worst in a decade, with 17 of 23 industrial categories recording declines. Capital goods output (representing fresh investment) declined 20.7%. GDP growth is approaching the 3.9% low of the Great Recession of 2008-09.

One reason is cyclical. The slowing world economy is pulling India down too.

But India also has serious structural flaws that will not mend easily. Unless mended, the new growth normal for India may be closer to 5% than the “miracle economy” benchmark of 7%. Former chief economic adviser Arvind Subramanian once theorised that statistical flaws were inflating official GDP growth by 2.5%. He said the distinct slowdown after 2011 in four indicators — exports, imports, electricity and credit growth — suggested GDP growth was between 3.5% and 5.5%, far lower than the official 7%.

当纳伦德拉•莫迪再次当选时，乐观主义者预计GDP增长速度将加速至8%。可惜的是，GDP增速在过去四个季度稳步下降—在继7%、6.8%、5.6%和5%之后，它正慢慢跌向4%。

预计7 - 9月份的数据将进一步下降至近4%。9月份工业生产指数为负4.3%，为10年来最差表现，23个工业类别中有17个出现下降。资本货物产量(代表新投资)下降了20.7%。GDP增长正接近2008-09年大衰退时期3.9%的低点。

原因之一是经济周期性。世界经济放缓也在拖累印度。

但印度也存在严重的结构性缺陷，修补起来并不容易。除非经济恢复正常，否则印度的新经济增长可能会比7%的“奇迹经济”基准更接近5%。前首席经济顾问阿文德•萨勃拉曼尼亚曾将统计缺陷推高了官方GDP增速2.5%作为理论依据。他说，2011年之后，出口、进口、电力和信贷四项指标的增速明显放缓，这表明GDP增速在3.5%至5.5%之间，远低于官方公布的7%。

I attacked this analysis saying no country derives growth estimates from just four indicators. He was right to raise doubts about 7% growth, but his estimate of 3.5-5.5 was too low. However, even the official data has now fallen to this range. The problem is not fudged data. India’s momentum sustained 7% growth for several years despite poor performance in the four measures because of the gains of internal trade. India failed to reap the gains of international trade, but a big expansion of roads, electricity and telecom to rural areas boosted internal trade between states, producing the economic gains that small countries can gain only from international trade. This sustained 7% growth for some years. But now over 90% of the country has roads, electricity and telecom, so further gains are tapering off. That, combined with global headwinds, has caused a plunge.

In the 2000s, India produced three world-class industries — software, automobiles and pharmaceuticals. In the 2010s, it hasn’t produced a single new world-class industry, mainly because of India’s lousy educational system. This produces a veneer of excellent graduates along with an army of unemployable semi-literates. The thin veneer was sufficient to create three champion industries in the 2000s, but it cannot create any more. The Economic Survey cried out for educational reform. But nothing has happened since the Budget.

India is uncompetitive in most economic inputs. Compared to competitors, India has higher costs of land, labour, capital, electricity, tax rates, rail and air freight. Only one of these — high corporate tax rates — has been tackled so far. Reportedly, the government plans to make larger land banks with environmental clearance available for major foreign investors. This is a partial solution. India needs more liberal land acquisition laws.

我抨击了这种分析，说没有哪个国家可以仅仅从四个指标就做出增长预测。他对7%增长的怀疑是正确的，但他预估的3.5-5.5%太低了。然而，现在就连官方数据也跌至这一区间内。问题不是捏造数据。尽管由于国内贸易的增长，印度在这四项指标上表现不佳，但其经济增长势头连续几年保持在7%。印度未能从国际贸易中获益，但公路、电力和电信向农村地区的大规模扩张促进了邦与邦之间的内部贸易，使印度经济连续几年保持了7%的增长。但现在，该国90%以上的地区都有公路、电力和电信，因此内部的继续增长慢慢减慢。再加上全球经济的逆风，导致了股市的暴跌。

2000年代，印度造就了三个世界级的产业—软件、汽车和制药。在21世纪10年代，它没能开创新的世界级产业，主要是因为印度糟糕的教育系统。印度的教育造就了一群优秀的毕业生和一群找不到工作的半文盲。经济调查迫切需要教育改革。但自预算案出台以来，什么都没发生。

印度在大多数经济投入方面缺乏竞争力。与竞争对手相比，印度在土地、劳动力、资本、电力、税率、铁路和空运方面的成本更高。迄今为止，只有一项措施——高企的企业税率——得到了解决。据报道，政府计划为主要外国投资者提供更大规模的土地银行和环境许可。这是部分解决之路。印度需要更宽松的土地征收法律。

The RBI cut interest rates, but this has not transmitted to borrowers. One reason is high interest rates for small savings which seem politically sacrosanct. This must end. High rates for industrial power subsidise farmers and towns. Electricity may be the next sector to default massively, extending the banking crisis. Power reforms are a must.

Railway freight rates have historically been kept high to subsidise passenger fares. That hits transport costs and hence exports. This too must stop.

In the short run, there is a case for fiscal stimulus. The fiscal deficit can be allowed to rise to anything up to 4% for this year. But history shows how difficult it is to end a stimulus, so caution is needed on this front. In any event we need to focus more on the long-term than short-term issues. Otherwise the days of miracle 7% growth will be over.

印度央行降低了利率，但这并没有传导到借贷者身上。原因之一是小额储蓄的高利率，这在政治上似乎是神圣不可侵犯的。必须终结。工业用电的高电价补贴了农民和城镇。这必须结束。电力可能是下一个大规模违约的行业，从而加剧银行业危机。电力改革势在必行。

历史上，铁路运价一直居高不下，用以补贴乘客车费。这打击了运输成本，进而影响了出口。这种情况也必须终止。

在短期内，有理由实施财政刺激。今年的财政赤字可以上升到4%。但历史表明，要结束刺激计划有多么困难，因此在这方面需要谨慎。无论如何，我们需要更多地关注长期问题，而非短期问题。否则，7%的经济增长奇迹将一去不复返。

《印度经济时报》网站读者评论：

来源：三泰虎    http://www.santaihu.com/48846.html       译者：Joyceliu

外文链接：https://economictimes.indiatimes.com

Ramesh Pathak

While it is very convenient to point out the structural flaws, the writer must also suggest credible measures for reforms. the writer must also analyse and report the money that has gone down the drain in financial frauds. When the financial system itself is moth eaten how can any economist in his right mind blame any govt. for this mess??..

指出结构性缺陷很容易，作者还必须提出可信的改革措施。作者还必须分析和报告在金融欺诈中流失的钱。当金融系统本身已被蛀得千疮百孔时，头脑正常的经济学家怎么能把这种混乱归咎于任何政府呢?

Shadi Katyal

In the past we used to hear our economy is ahead of but evidently economy is in such downward move that no one dares to talk about it.Has any one heard about any agenda or Modi even talk of Economy. BJP goal is more political than econmics. Modi and Shah are fighting for elections. Where are all those millions of investments coming from abroad and what nation has gained if anything with all these trips by Modi.A nation which has Law and Order and free judiciary can move ahed but with lynching,mob rule and rapes weho will invest and when?

过去我们常常听人说，我们的经济领先于，但显然，现在经济一路下行，没有人敢再提起。有人听说过什么议程吗？莫迪也没提过经济问题。人民党的目标更多地在于政治而非经济。莫迪和沙阿正在为选举而战。数百万来自海外的投资都到哪里去了?莫迪的出访又给这个国家带来了什么?一个有法律、秩序和公正司法的国家值得投资，但是有私刑、暴民统治和强奸的话，谁愿意投资？何时愿意来投资？

Realdeshbhakt

I think ,there is no need to lecture BJP govt about economy.It is not the agenda of BJP govt but politics is.MOdi is running india on Indira gandhi''s formula and this has reduced growth to 2%.Pretty soon it will reach 0 % and then negative.

我认为，没有必要就经济问题对人民党政府说教。这不是人民党政府的发展目标，他们的目标只在于政治。莫迪是按照英迪拉·甘地的模式来管理印度的，这将经济增长率降低到了2%。很快就会达到0 %，最后会跌至负数。

Common Indian

The only thing I disagree with is Mr. Aiyar''s statement about savings rate for Bank deposits. They should indeed be sacrosanct, atleast in the case of senior citizens. I hope Government can provide long term fixed rate instruments with capital protection on their retirement savings deposits for them.

我唯一不同意的是Aiyar先生关于银行存款利率的声明。存款利率确实应该是神圣不可侵犯的，至少对老年人来说是如此。我希望政府能为他们的退休储蓄存款提供长期的固定利率工具和资本保障。

Common Indian

Good article. Structural fixes in banking will give fruits. We also need to encourage people to get Masters and PhD after completing undergraduation.

这是一篇好文章。银行业的结构性调整将带来成果。我们还需要鼓励人们在完成本科学业后攻读硕士和博士学位。

Abhineshwar Jena

''over 90% of the country has roads, electricity and telecom''. where did the author get such figures from? Is it possible in a poor country like ours? The author''s hypothesis falls flat if it is not true.

“全国90%以上的地方都有公路、电力和电信”。作者从哪里获取这些数据的？在我们这样的穷国里可能吗？作者的假设如果不正确，就是空谈。

ANJANI KUMAR

Who cares for GDP numbers and industrial growth.in the present situation of global warming a slow down and reassessment of priorities is required.sustainable ,man power intensive,low energy requiring industries have to be encouraged.as for global competitiveness,how can you expect our products to be global standard?

谁在乎GDP数据和工业增长。在目前全球变暖的情况下，需要减缓和重新评估优先发展事项。必须鼓励可持续、人力密集、低能耗的工业。至于全球竞争力，你怎么能期望我们的产品达到全球标准？

Asis Banerjee

A Great article. Only on Education that has been called LOUSY - I would put my comment as: When BJP came to Power in 2014, I strongly suggested to HR Minister to disband UGC & AICTE (for Engineering). Of course, nothing was done due to the tremendous lack of "competent" people in the Ministry. By making some "committees" will not help. Few People with vision must devise something useful - starting with Syllabus, Teaching-Learning Process, etc.. Nothing else...

这是一篇很棒的文章。我只对被作者称为垃圾的教育这一点有所异议：当人民党2014年上台时，我强烈建议人力资源部长解散UGC和AICTE(工程)。当然，由于部里极度缺乏“有能力”的人，所以不了了之。建立这些“委员会”是没有用的。少数有远见的人要设计出有用的东西——从教学大纲、教学过程等入手。我说完了。

Realdeshbhakt

UGC-AICTE-MCI are already in process of dismantling.But the new syllabus by BJP govt seems to be copied directly from US universities which does not cater to our realities-industries and society

UGC-AICTE-MCI已经着手解散了。但是人民党政府的新教学大纲似乎是直接从美国大学照搬过来的，不符合我们的实际情况——在工业和社会方面。

Asis Banerjee

1) University Education has an UNIVERSAL appeal - so copying may not be a bad idea per se.2) Even if we copied some of the best US Univ., we would hv been result-oriented - as they are very much innovative - and despite having a huge potential - we are not as much. Lets live with this TRUTH...

1)大学教育具有普遍吸引力——所以复制照搬可能并不是一个坏主意；2)即便我们要照搬一些最好的美国大学的东西，我们也要以结果为导向，他们非常创新——尽管拥有巨大的潜力——我们远远比不上他们。让我们接受这个事实吧…

Kochar Bipin

RBI has essentially choked off credit flow to the real estate sector, the largest employer of unskilled workers - causing lacs of them to lose their jobs and putting lifetime savings of lacs of homebuyers at risk. Time, RBI classifies this sector as priority and ensures that funding needs are met.

印度央行基本上阻断了信贷流向房地产行业的路径，而房地产行业是非技术工人的最大雇主——这导致其中的一些人失去了工作，并将购房者的毕生储蓄置于风险之中。印度央行将这一领域列为优先领域，并确保资金需求得到满足。

Shaleen Nath Tripathi

Lower tax cut by the Govt could increase demand and price expectations and investment spending... Lower taxes are also a form of public spending...

政府减税可能会增加需求、价格预期和投资支出……减税也是公共支出的一种形式……

Shaleen Nath Tripathi

Lower tax....

减税吧....

Bijul Desai

Sometimes i wonder BJP performance Economy perspective has been dismal ...Jobs / GDP / Manufacturing all looks to be down ...

有时我很质疑人民党的表现，经济前景一直惨淡…就业/ GDP /制造业看起来都在下降……

PK

Power tariffs can be brought down only if the power plants are located near the coal mines.

只有把发电厂建在煤矿附近，电价才能降低。

Ramakrishna Aarkay

Sir Liberal land to MNCs seems not a good idea,more infra push from Govt is needed to improve consumer demand,maintenance of roads is shabby,is equi to nit having road at all.Re power implementation of renewables generation needs a cery sincere approach by all concerned

给跨国公司提供土地似乎不是个好主意，政府需要提供更多的基础设施建设来改善消费者需求，道路维护工作很差劲，有路也等于没路。实施可再生能源发电，需要各方拿出切实可行的行动来。

Vilas Save

1 scrap reservations in education immediately2 increase productivity of judges instead of number.3 revaluate all capital expenditure for cost benefit analysis4 challenge borrowers to use funds efficiently instead of demanding lower and lower interest rates.5 Give very harsh punishment to fraudsters in banking and finance to serve as example.

1取消教育系统内的预留制；2提高法官的工作效率而不是数量。3重新评估所有的资本支出以进行成本效益分析；4要求借款人有效地使用资金，而不是要求利率越降越低；5以银行和金融业的诈骗犯为例，给予严厉的惩罚。

Ban Porno Bollywood Movies

If we watched movies in 60s and 70s they danced around trees and talked about moon and stars and walked across deserted roads and resided in bunglows. Today many in India dont see trees or moon or stars and roads are crouded and polluted and matchbox size apartments cost crores. Main problem is uncontolled increase in poooooooooooooopulation. Ban more than two kids for anyone and no kids for convicted criminals and rapists.

如果我们观看六七十年代的电影，会看到他们围着树跳舞，谈论月亮和星星，走过废弃的道路，住在茅屋里。今天，许多印度人看不到树木、月亮或星星，道路被污染，火柴盒大小的公寓价值数百万卢比。印度的主要问题在于人口的失控增长。应该禁止所有人生两个以上的孩子，禁止已被定罪的罪犯和强奸犯生孩子。

Anand Deshpande

Wake up India

印度快点苏醒吧

Sujal Patil

wheel of economy way moving properly, it''s TRUE we had lots of problems but GDP growth was fair but we wanted more and for that we elected BJP but then its DEMONETIZATION, then its GST , this all things have slowed wheel of growth and economic activitys, people lost faith, its very difficult situation, and other side is CHINA our biggest problem, CHINA is killing our industry''s by exporting each and every thing to INDIA, NO one is caring for us for NATION...

经济的车轮正常运转，没错，我们有很多问题，但国内生产总值(GDP)增长之前挺好的，但我们想要更多，为此，我们选出了人民党，他们出台了废钞令，紧接着又是商品服务税，这一切拖慢了增长的速度，经济活动放缓，人们失去了信心，这是非常困难的局面。另一边是，这是我们面临的最大问题，通过出口所有商品，绞杀了我们的行业。没有人关心我们的国家…

Joshua Pereira

So who’s fault is it.

这究竟是谁的错。

BMKCT

Swamy mentions the lousy education system as a problem but has no solution. This is typical of the weak heads present all over India and the world - complaining but having no solutions.

Swamy提到糟糕的教育系统是个问题，但没有解决办法。这是印度和世界各地弱智者的典型表现——只会抱怨，却提不出解决办法。

BMKCT

The point is that the lower GDP has genesis in that the BJP has not fully been able to solve and has not rightly solved the economic inequalities menace in India and all over the world.

GDP下降的根源在于，人民党没有完全解决、也没有能力正确解决印度乃至全世界的经济不平等威胁。

BMKCT

Let me set the record straight here, dodo bozo. First, GDP is not at all the way to measure the economic well-being of a geography and its people.

让我澄清一下，傻蛋。首先，GDP根本不能衡量一个地区及其人民的经济福祉。

Hassan

From day one after Independence India has been unfortunate not to have a leader with a vision to make India a truly economic power. Instead all the leaders are interested in getting votes to stay in power using methods such as reservations, ration cards, subsidies, nationalization backed by corruption.As a result industry is based on outdated technology, research and innovation is unknown, education system 100 years old. Sooner or later the economic comes up against a mountain of problems and growth halts.

从独立后的第一天起，印度就很不幸，始终没找到一个有足够远见、能使印度成为真正经济强国的领导人。相反，所有的领导人都只对通过诸如预留制、配给卡、补贴、腐败的国有化等手段来获得选票以继续掌权感兴趣。因此，工业生产只有过时的技术，研究和创新无声无息，教育制度僵腐百年。经济迟早会遇到堆积如山的问题和增长停滞。

Mukund Kansal

Gujjus capable of doing only politics... In economics, BJP is 2/10, politics 9/10...

古吉拉邦人只会搞政治…经济方面，人民党是2/10，政治方面是9/10…

Rajeev

As of now, Indian real GDP is possible to reach only 3% or less(unless they ''cook'' the GDP figure or take the help of money launderers ......Before anything positive can happen, Indians should introspect how suddenly Indian GDP went up in 2009-12

到目前为止，印度的实际GDP可能只有3%甚至更低，除非他们“伪造”GDP数据或者接受洗钱者的帮助……在任何积极的事情发生之前，印度人应该反省一下印度GDP在2009-2012年是如何突然增长的

Ashok Agrawal

The purchasing power of people has seriously dwindled due to a myriad of factors like low returns on savings, retrenchment, low white collar employment ,high personal taxes a d GST. There are tax evaders and dishonest people who are kee Tax to GDP ratio low at about 11-12 %.

由于储蓄回报率低、紧缩开支、白领就业率低、个人所得税和消费税高，人们的购买力严重下降。逃税者和不诚实的人，他们将税收占GDP的比例保持在较低水平，约为11- 12%。