LogFAQs > #950349597

RedWhiteBlue posted...

Then why bother showing up? Either continue to try and present information, and pre emptively strike down the arguments that will show up and why their sources are wrong, or stop trying to stir the pot.

Why not ask the people who support the protest without knowing anything about it to support their reasoning? Ever notice that the specifics of these bills are never mentioned, we just hear "protest in India" a lot without anyone ever bothering to mention why?

The Indian economy is an extreme form of dirigisme where the government plays a directive role instead of a regulatory one. Nationalization, protectionism, price controls, monopolies, state intervention, etc. It's largely why India has lagged behind other developing nations in economic growth and why poverty remains high in the country.

Some of these bad policies, like the Permit Raj system, were eliminated in 1990 as India faced an economic crisis and was forced to embrace limited economic reforms. But others remain. For example farmers in India cannot legally sell their goods on the open market! They must sell to APMCs, which are government granted local monopolies. The APMC must pay a legally mandated minimum price, but does not have to pay anything over that. Once the APMC buys the food from farmers they are legally able to sell it at market rate to whoever they want.

Obviously there are problems with such a dumb system. Because farmers have to sell at the minimum price but APMCs do not, it means all the profits go to these useless middlemen and not the farmers. The APMCs, being a government granted monopoly, have the power to charge above market rates which has resulted in rising food cost in India. Productivity increases which usually benefit both producer and consumer (it's more profitable to sell a larger quantity of goods at a cheaper price) are not realized in India because of the minimum price that must be paid. And if the market price for a good dips below the minimum price the government ends up buying all the surplus grain at an enormous cost to taxpayers.

But in a plot twist everyone saw coming, these APMCs are mostly run by politicians who aren't about to let go of their monopolies without a fight.