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Economic growth is when you miss funerals (sopuli.xyz)

submitted 2 days ago by crmsnbleyd@sopuli.xyz to c/linkedinlunatics@sh.itjust.works

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[–] corsicanguppy@lemmy.ca 7 points 2 days ago (1 children)

So we consider India's growth a success even when we know it's being built on the backs of the underpaid? Like, if they were actually feeding people into a concrete mix to build walls and roads, it's the only way India's growth can be more strongly tied to abuse of the working class.

If their success is by all but eating their own, can we call that a success? Can we call that growth without drawing parallels to rising humanitarian debt like a gambler's bank account? They're spending the lives of their workers the way Ai companies spend investment money, with no escape function to get out of the loop.

[–] shawn1122@sh.itjust.works 5 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (1 children)

Did not the two wealthiest and most powerful nations on Earth today have the same trajectory?

Workers rights weren't exactly pretty in the US in the early 1900s and we've witnessed the human cost of China's development in our lifetimes.

The way I see it you have two (simplified) options. You can try to to go slow and do it a bit more perfectly or go fast and get there sooner.

India tried to go slow. It spent 40 years post independence being isolationist and quasisocialist. What did it get for that?

The Western capitalist/neoliberal world order didn't see value in it so what India got was what was later termed by Indian economist Raj Krishna as the "Hindu rate of growth" ie. 4% GDP growth annually (underperformance for an emerging market).

India has since embraced the neoliberal world order which makes it a friend of Western nations economically. This means it's now growing at a rate of 6 to 8% annually and on track to be a high income nation in 20-25 years. Millions have been pulled out of poverty and millions more will be still.

Do I like neoliberalism? Of course not. But the richest nations on earth make the rules and they've made it very clear that you can either play by them and have some of their wealth make it to you sooner or reject their framework and die in poverty and squalor.

Do I think this is an ideal situation? No its not. In an ideal world India could provide advanced economy level worker protections and still grow at the same rate. The problem is the richest nations on earth see India's monetary value as its young, more affordable workforce. If India refused to bring that to the table, the timeline on which it would achieve becoming a high income nation would extend substantially.

[–] crmsnbleyd@sopuli.xyz 2 points 2 days ago (1 children)

There are other nations where people aren't treated like chattel

[–] shawn1122@sh.itjust.works 1 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

Doubt they are of the size and diversity of India which makes things far from simple. Exaggeration aside, people are not chattel in India.

If you're referring to the four Asian tigers:

Two received substantial aid from the US post WW2.
More predictable terrain and abundant coastline (relative to size) make an export based model (selling goods to the West) more feasible.
Small population size and less linguistic variability makes central planning (when it comes to education and skills building) more effective on a shorter time scale.

Ultimately India's economic growth post WW2 was harmed most by

Remaining non-aligned post WW2 which pushed the US to side with Pakistan as their key ally in South Asia. It's understandable since Western powers were a scourge upon India for the 300 years prior but America was not colonial Britian, Netherlands, Portugal etc. (though that's easy to say in hindsight).
Adopting a dirigisme economic model which contrasts with laissez faire policies, leaning in favor of market intervention and prioritizing import substitution industrialization which is an isolationist policy that seeks to reduce global reliance (in what was an ever globalizing world). This was largely also a reflexive response to colonialism as "trade" with colonial powers decimated and deindustrialized the Indian economy which accounted for 25% of global GDP prior to the colonial era.