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India lifted 415M out of poverty in 15 years, says UN

economictimes.indiatimes.com

431–440 of 544 posts

Re: India lifted 415M out of poverty in 15 years, says UN

#431

Interested in comments from anyone who lives in India or has experience/familiarity with it as to whether reality on the ground matches the rosy picture painted in the article.

Purely anecdotal, please don’t ask me for data, sources etc. It seems to me the government is doing a good job of supporting those at or below abject poverty. There are food security programs, free medical aid, education, and I guess even housing. Of course the poor have to wade through bureaucratic and corrupt system. But with digitization it’s getting fixed to an extent. That said, the huge challenge I see is in th…

> jobs just don’t exist any more.

This seems more like propaganda. I come from a small village. No one in the village is jobless, or hard pressed to meet basic necessities. In fact there is acute labor shortage in agriculture. I have a cousin who probably failed in his 10th grade. He picked up some driving skill, and works in one of the road construction companies. He recently got fired because he wanted to work from a different place, and the company didn't have an opening in that place. He found a similar job at his preferred place within a week. He has his own car, and saved enough to start a side gig setting up a pharmacy where he employs couple of people.

There is no dearth of work for people willing to work, and are flexible. It's a different matter if someone wants to find a cushy government job.

Re: India lifted 415M out of poverty in 15 years, says UN

#432
post #284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is fil?

Father-in-law. Like BIL for Brother-in-law. Apropos, I've always wondered where the terms gf and bf, for girlfriend and boyfriend, came from, i.e. the West, or India. Wonder, because many such short forms come from or are unique to Indian English.

It's the obvious acronym for those words

Re: India lifted 415M out of poverty in 15 years, says UN

#433

Do millennial and gen-z Indians have a similarly skeptical view towards capitalism held by so many young people in NA and the EU? I had a friend tell me the other day that I couldn't be anti-racist if I wasn't anti-capitalist, because capitalism is by inherently racist. Ever since 2018 or so it seems as if anti-capitalism has become part of the mainstream progressive Western viewpoint, while I don't remember that bei…

South Asia was captured by the East India Company, and the wealth of its people systematically extracted over centuries. This is different from the many other local wars and invasions that happened in India before and during this time, where either the invaders left after stealing wealth once, or they stayed and generally tried to improve the area they captured. Systematic extraction of wealth was only a feature of c…

> South Asia was captured by the East India Company

Funny, they chose to call the company "East India company", instead of "South Asian company" :)

Re: India lifted 415M out of poverty in 15 years, says UN

#434

While my country has made tremendous progress, I wonder how precise these numbers are. India's poverty line doesn't gets redrawn every year to account for the inflation and increased cost of living. The current definition of the poverty line is daily earnings 27 rs for rural areas and 33 for urban, which is a ludicrously low number. Even beggars earn more than that. Of course we will have very low poverty if we use s…

It is hilariously unique indian mentality. Jumping on any positive news about the country to correct why it cant be. It always starts with "believe me im indian". A glance over the report could have prevented it.

It uses Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI) not something you are referring to.

Re: India lifted 415M out of poverty in 15 years, says UN

#435

A roommate in college was from a small rural village in Vietnam and a first gen college student. It took his entire extended family to pay the cost of tuition (international student rates). At the age of 18 he was putting in 60 -70 hours a week to his studies, as the responsibility he felt to his family to earn that sacrifice was overwhelming and less than an a perfect score visibly upset him. Not knowing any better…

Someone's chopping onions. I feel I'm faking it everytime I read something like this.

As a human interest story. I'd like to know more if you're okay to share. How is he doing now?

Re: India lifted 415M out of poverty in 15 years, says UN

#437

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> hate for capitalism is pretty old in certain parts of the world. I would like to have a different take. India has a strong merchant class since aeons and market economy was never a taboo culturally. You can see that in the entrepreneurs like Bansals, Agrawals, Shahs that are at the helm of Indian Unicorns. So yes, there is a skepticism about 'western' capitalism, but not for market economics.

I don't see how we disagree. I am aware that capitalism and market based economies are not one-to-one. The share-holder system is what results in massive exploitation in capitalism. Market economies can also exploit but not in the same dispassionate way that share-holders do.

[deleted]

Re: India lifted 415M out of poverty in 15 years, says UN

#438

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure what the "free market" has to do with it. Capitalism, communism, feudalism, socialism, etc.. always end with the majority of money and power concentrated with the few. It's just human behavior to be selfish.

I agree with the first part of your point, but this in particular is an emergent phenomena that only happens with large-scale civilizations. So I think some kind of sociological argument makes more sense (I don't know what that would be though).

> this in particular is an emergent phenomena that only happens with large-scale civilizations

Is it? If you have N participants in a market and a bunch of investment opportunities that are on average net negative, the person with the most money will take the most opportunities resulting in their relative worth increasing the most. The endgame for this is one person with all the money. Works for N=2 and N≃infinity.

It doesn't happen in (some? most?) small communities because of specific things that aren't present in big communities.

Re: India lifted 415M out of poverty in 15 years, says UN

#439

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I had a friend tell me the other day that I couldn't be anti-racist if I wasn't anti-capitalist, because capitalism is by inherently racist. I think you need to get more educated friends.

FWIW, she has a Masters in French Lit from one of our relatively well-respected schools, but obviously I completely disagree with her on most political topics. These kinds of stances are more common than you'd think in Canadian academic circles.

Still this assertion goes much too far

>I couldn't be anti-racist if I wasn't anti-capitalist

Maybe flip it around and ask her why she hates the global poor so much

Re: India lifted 415M out of poverty in 15 years, says UN

#440
post #363

While my country has made tremendous progress, I wonder how precise these numbers are. India's poverty line doesn't gets redrawn every year to account for the inflation and increased cost of living. The current definition of the poverty line is daily earnings 27 rs for rural areas and 33 for urban, which is a ludicrously low number. Even beggars earn more than that. Of course we will have very low poverty if we use s…

To put things in perspective, I have 40 Rs in my wallet now, and I can't buy anything with it. It's less than a dollar, and it feels like less than a dollar. Edit: to put things in perspective, I'm a tourist

Depends if you plan to order takeout from an acceptable place or just “get something” like others seem to be suggesting.

And, yes, it does feel less than a dollar if you choose the acceptable option.

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