India continues to screw Brits and Americans 4424

Hoard it, Ranjit

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"Indians are the world's biggest gold consumers, with more than half the country's savings tied up in physical buttets. Particularly among the very poorest, Indians are prone to spending much of their income to acquire the metal, locking up their buttets in the resulting hoards. Economists say such a high rate of hoarding constrains the Indian economy, which is short of capital"

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"Keynes like many other Indian economists observed this Indian habit of a propensity to hoard cash."

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"Hoarding is usually referred to in the context of profiteers and black marketers. No doubt, unscrupulous businessmen resort to hoarding with the aim of reaping high profits. This happens whenever there is even an apprehension of scarcity. So, whenever a monsoon is unfavourable, goods go out of market even though new crops are yet to come and they may not be affected by the bad season at all. This creates tension and panic. Although there is no scarcity as such, the profiteer creates it artificially. The panic-struck consumer makes frantic purchases and the demand escalates. This artificial scarcity and undue increase in demand leads to an increase in prices and a vicious circle of created scarcity and panic buying starts, aggravating the situation."

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Voltaire on India... "The sum of what we have to say of India in general is, that it is gioverned by 30 tyrants, who acknowledge an emporer, sunk, like themselves in luxury and debauch, and who devour the substance of the people. There are no fixed courts of justice there, the depositaries of the laws, which protect the weak against the powerful. A problem very difficult to solve is how gold ans silver which comes from America into Europe should continually be carried into Hindustan, and there swallowed up, never to

reappear; and that nevertheless the people should be in general poor and work for almost nothing. But the reason is that the money does not go amongst the people but to the merchants, who pay immense duties to the governors, these governors give a great part of their profits to the great mogul and hide the rest. Man's labour is the worse paid in this, the richest country on Earth, than anywhere else; because in every country the pay of a day labourer seldom exceeds his subsistence and clothing; now the extreme fruitfulness of the soil of India, and the heat of the climate,

make subsistence and clothing come to almost nothing"