411–420 of 456 posts
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you can audit a small number and know. sure the clerk can risk one, but statistically they are caught with enough.
By "you" you mean a regular Russian citizen? Who is in charge of the clerks under this system, and what ensures that they aren't as corrupt as before?
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Why dont you try building a residential property or factory on a land zoned for public parks and tell me how that goes in your country?
Most US cities as they exist today would not exist if you could not convert agricultural land to other uses. Where does suburbia come from? Former farms.
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I have a funny story from Spain: My father's has an orange field, so at some point he wanted to dig a well to get some water. He went to the City Hall, got all the tricky paperwork and applied for permission to build it. Months passed by without hearing anything, and at some point he just forgot about it, assuming he'd be denied silently. There's some people in the city hall don't like him too much BTW. Few years lat…
A friend of mine in Spain bought a masia, but was not allowed to tear down the old building to build a new house (protected heritage or something, even though it was junk). So the way around it was to do it in steps. Replace it whole building part by part. So now he has a new house (but it looks like the old one in shape), but there's nothing left of the original.
India's obsession with paperwork is unceasing and baffling. Everything requires an application, even when everything can be done digitally. You need letters and stamps to get anything done. Case in point: the "company stamps" that are required for everything you do with your business. From getting a debit card to changing the maturity instructions for a corporate deposit, you need to sign your name AND stamp it with…
Countries with high paperwork and bureaucratic burden are famous for also being highly corrupt. This is probably not a coincidence. Likely all the excess paperwork makes it easier to hide what's really going on, easy to provide roadblocks for those who don't pay, and easier to generally hide bad activity in a sea of noise.
In the article, the author needs to chase dozens of different bits of paperwork. Quite a few there were no problem. But quite a few incompetent, corrupt, or both. Now, how about a system where you submit one application in one place, and if other departments need to know or collect fees or approve it is the responsibility of the submission point to pay or collect approvals? One desk is held responsible.
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I remember dropping my bag at a luggage store at the big train station in Mumbai. Bags needed to be scanned before being stored, not uncommon. Except the scanner was on the other side of the station. So I was sent off and queued up to get my bag scanned and more importantly get my receipt stamped to say it'd been scanned walked back through the crowds where I could have done anything with the bag - to the luggage dro…
Malls are the worst when it comes to security theater. Most will check your car's boot for illicit materials when you park. But they won't check the car's interios - you could have anything inside! You'll usually be frisked at the mall entrance. Women will only get frisked by a female security guard. If the female security guard is absent (pretty common), any female visitor can just walk through without getting frisk…
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Back when GST was introduced, they asked all exporters of software services to pay the 18% GST and then claim a refund because exports are exempted. This was before they introduced a process to apply for a "NOC" (which must be renewed periodically I think). So, I duly paid GST for the first couple of months. 5 years later, I'm yet to receive the refunds. First, they said that they were authorized to only sanction ref…
Are you sure these aren't just thinly-veiled requests for a bribe?
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I remember buying a train ticket in Goa. This involved showing the passport and filling out multiple forms. It was pretty crazy.
That reminds of a story about an Indian couple travelling Europe. SO, obviously, within the Schengen countries you do not need additional visas, something foreign to said couple. So, they crossed Eu border by train and ended up in another country. Confused over what to do next, they talked to the next police officer they found, because the couple was sure they couldn't just continue their journey without any further…
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Back when GST was introduced, they asked all exporters of software services to pay the 18% GST and then claim a refund because exports are exempted. This was before they introduced a process to apply for a "NOC" (which must be renewed periodically I think). So, I duly paid GST for the first couple of months. 5 years later, I'm yet to receive the refunds. First, they said that they were authorized to only sanction ref…
That sounds awful. Curious to hear if you were able to avoid GST payments in later years as should be the case for exports.
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> I would go as far as to say... In the UK, it wasn't corruption. These people were paid money for products, they delivered those products, the price paid wasn't excessive. The UK has an independent auditor that found no evidence of corruption, and that (where product was delivered incorrectly) it was due to problems with contract specs. Afaik, there is only one case where a person was directly involved in politics a…
Private Eye has covered this. The level of profit was not normal. Some of the companies were making 50%. And the government had two lists of companies when they were awarding contracts. The priority list was for the acquaintances of ministers and MPs. It smells very bad.
No, the priority list wasn't. To approve a vendor through the normal process would have taken years, the fast track process was created to get PPE quicker than normal. I believe all but one person was unrelated to the Tories, the only person who wasn't (as I have said) repeatedly lied about their connection to the vendor, and is now facing criminal charges.
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> I would go as far as to say... In the UK, it wasn't corruption. These people were paid money for products, they delivered those products, the price paid wasn't excessive. The UK has an independent auditor that found no evidence of corruption, and that (where product was delivered incorrectly) it was due to problems with contract specs. Afaik, there is only one case where a person was directly involved in politics a…
I think your argument boils down to don't assign to corruption what could more easily be assigned to incompetence. Which I think is a fair point but does raise some questions about the competency of the civil servants and politicians we trust with a fairly large chunk of our income.