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How India Became America

nytimes.com

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Re: How India Became America

#51

Post by wisty »

pavanky wrote: post #25
edderly wrote: post #3

Before the elites in India consider themselves comparable to America, I would hope they address the swingeing poverty and piss poor literacy. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poverty_in_India http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_literacy_r...

1) Literacy The problem with the 75 % literacy is that many of those uneducated people are old and can not be taught now. The literacy of youth is about 85% which is still bad, but the number is gaining exponentially and should be near American levels in 15 years. That is less than a generation. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Literacy_in_India 2) Poverty India has been free for 65 years. This was after 200 years of Bri…

I don't think the "resource strip-mining" probably wasn't that big a factor.

The big problem was, they used "divide and conquer". The British were masters at it - find a minority in a region, and give them guns and military assistance. The minorities can now be relied on to keep the rest of the population under control, and they can't rebel against the British for fear of a reprisal from the majority.

The problem is, it leaves a real mess when the Brits leave.

Re: How India Became America

#52

Post by nodemaker »

justincormack wrote: post #47
nodemaker wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>number of international awards won by Indians IN india -Nobel Prize, Fields medal etc is next to zero) Well at least its not zero.Rabindra Nath Tagore got it for his brilliant work - Geetanjali, Amartya Sen got it for his work on poverty and famines, C.V Raman got it for discovering what is now called the Raman Effect. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nobel_laureates_of_India Also there have been notable achievements th…

Sen is not "an Indian in India" he was at Harvard and Cambridge.

Well yes he did spend most of work life outside India.But then he was in India for significant periods too.

For example between 1961 to 1972 he was at the Delhi School of Economics, where he completed his work Collective Choice and Social Welfare

Re: How India Became America

#54

Post by [deleted] »

suprgeek wrote: post #41

(Speaking as person who has spent 10+ years in each country) India is no where close to America. There are so many enormous fundamental differences that anyone making such a comparison needs to be looked at as naive at best. - India's population id 4X that of America - More than half the population is below the poverty line - India is amongst the most corrupt nations in the world http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Index_of…

[deleted]

Re: How India Became America

#55

Post by shareme »

unhappyhippie wrote: post #6

As an Indian who has spent all but two years of his life in India, when I read stories like this I think of two possibilities: 1. Propaganda by affluent and successful Indians claiming the country is as successful as they are. 2. Westerners overstating Indian progress to feel more comfortable that there is a friendly and reliable challenger to China from the developing world. I don't know, I may be wrong on both coun…

a question..

Many other countries with corruption problems see a huge increase in skilled worker outflows..namely Russia with a 2 million outflow every 10 years..

Is India also facing a killed worker outflow due to corruption conditions? Outflow in the sense that the number is higher than the net difference between the birth and death rates.

Re: How India Became America

#57

Post by furiouslysleepy »

mds101 wrote: post #50
wisty wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Indians by and large "play it safe" in everything If you're an Indian businessperson, you have two options - copy the US and make a good ROI, or risk everything on creating a new product for a potentially better ROI. The choice is obvious - it's far cheaper (and more beneficial) to play catch-up than innovate. The question is - why is India still playing catch-up? I don't know that much about India. I'm guessing th…

I believe you misinterpreted his words. Being an 'Indian businessperson' itself is not done much because of the 'play it safe' attitude. Yes, Indians are that risk-averse.

Well, most people around the world are averse to business. Is there really a bigger proportion of Chinese or Russian or Egyptian businesspersons than Indian? (In fact, India has a handful of extremely business-minded communities -- the Marwadis and the Gujaratis, and to a lesser extent the Punjabis, Sindhis and Malayalis. If anything, India does relatively well on this metric.)

Re: How India Became America

#58

Post by pramodbiligiri »

nsns wrote: post #40

There are some excellent investigative magazines in India, check these out if you're looking for in-depth coverage of the Indian situation: http://www.epw.org.in/epw/user/userindex.jsp http://www.frontlineonnet.com/ http://www.openthemagazine.com/ http://www.tehelka.com/

I'd add The Caravan to that - http://www.caravanmagazine.in/

Re: How India Became America

#59

Post by furiouslysleepy »

mds101 wrote: post #27
unhappyhippie wrote: post #6

As an Indian who has spent all but two years of his life in India, when I read stories like this I think of two possibilities: 1. Propaganda by affluent and successful Indians claiming the country is as successful as they are. 2. Westerners overstating Indian progress to feel more comfortable that there is a friendly and reliable challenger to China from the developing world. I don't know, I may be wrong on both coun…

>the reality is that we are a dirt poor country with not just deep institutional problems, but also moral and psychological ones. I was searching for the words to express this for more than ten minutes before I read your comment. The key here is 'moral and psychological problems'. To cite just one example, there was a lot of ruckus about the 2G Scam and the Lokpal bill recently. We believe that the guy who got 17200…

Ironically, I agree with the comment you're replying to but not with you. Political hypocrisy favoring people you like is seen everywhere. Even if that were NOT the case, I find it difficult to get less worked up about 1,72,00,00,00,000 rupees than maybe 5-10,00,000 rupees.

The middle-class attitude to not risk much is also something we should not blame Indians for -- remember that most of the middle class (that's in the 'service' sector) is actually Bramhin, which means that it's a step down in status from what their ancestors enjoyed. And when you look at the looong way down you can fall in India socioeconomically... it's hard to blame someone for being risk-averse.

Re: How India Became America

#60

Post by furiouslysleepy »

shareme wrote: post #55
unhappyhippie wrote: post #6

As an Indian who has spent all but two years of his life in India, when I read stories like this I think of two possibilities: 1. Propaganda by affluent and successful Indians claiming the country is as successful as they are. 2. Westerners overstating Indian progress to feel more comfortable that there is a friendly and reliable challenger to China from the developing world. I don't know, I may be wrong on both coun…

a question.. Many other countries with corruption problems see a huge increase in skilled worker outflows..namely Russia with a 2 million outflow every 10 years.. Is India also facing a killed worker outflow due to corruption conditions? Outflow in the sense that the number is higher than the net difference between the birth and death rates.

That's a nice observation, and definitely true in India's case.

Out of curiosity, is this a robust thing? Is corruption a good indicator of 'brain-drain'?

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