Main problem of the country is not electricity, but high population, high corruption, consumerism, farmers' suicide and galloping inflation. Sonia & MMS hurried for the n deal only to divert peoples' attention from real problems. Following measures r required for taming galloping inflation.
1. Stop forward trading in essential items. Big traders hoard lot of goods to artificailly increase prices. Left had been demanding this for a long time.
2. Increase taxes drastically on sale of cars. Petrolium is to b imported for all the vehicles. Roads all over the country r already getting jammed due to lot of vehicles. These vehicles also create pollution.
3. Reduce taxes on bicycles. Provide separate lane for cycles for safety, as is the case in Japan, Germany, Holland, France etc.
4. Hand / Bullock carts should b allowed in market areas and banned on main roads.
5. Govt should propagate the virtues of simple living through all types of medias.
6. For long term solution, implement one child norm forcefully, as is being doen in China since 1979. We've only 2.4% of world's land but already hv 16% of its population, which is still increasing @1.6%, compared to 0.6% of China. One child norm will not reduce population, it will only reduce rate of growth of population.
7. Levy tax on agricultural income of rich farmers. Many politicians and industrialists save misuse this facility.
RE:Real problems & their solution
by Girish Rao on Aug 04, 2008 07:39 PM Permalink
India already follows the slab income tax where the high earners pay the highest tax. Simple living is good in theory and at a personal level, but from a economic stand point, if people do not spend economic growth slows down. So encourage people to spend wisely. We already pay very high taxes on cars compared to rest of the world. India is a high taxation country except for maybe some nordic countries , canada, germany etc.
RE:Real problems & their solution
by Ram Sharma on Aug 04, 2008 09:28 PM Permalink
Yes slab income tax is there, but taxes hv been lowered a lot for the rich.
Simple living is not only good in theory but also in practice. It is well known that lot of materialstic development hs taken place in develoed world, but people's happiness has not increased. What is important is happiness and not GDP growth, which is causing global warming, deforestation, pollution etc.
Taxes on cars should b increased to reduce increase in polution and encourag people to adopt cycling or motor cycle.
RE:Real problems & their solution
by Jagadis Bose on Aug 04, 2008 08:09 PM Permalink
I agree with all the above. But to these I will add:
10. Increase investments in primary and secondar education by 500-1000%. I am not joking -- the percentage of our GDP that the government spends on primary education is very low compared to other countries. This would involve raising teachers salaries considerably. The NCERT said yesterday that nonone wants to be a teacher these days.
11. Increase investment in public health. We should shift the emphasis from training doctors who then refuse to leave urban areas, to training a much larger number of publich health workers with roots in rural areas, who can deliver basic services including some requiring basic surgical skills.
