More than a decade ago, I read 'A Colossal Failure of Common Sense' by Lawrence G. McDonald. If my memory serves me right, I first heard of it because Charlie Munger mentioned it somewhere. Two years ago he published his second book, 'How to Listen When Markets Speak'. I bought it immediately then and was impressed by the analysis. The historical perspective, the insights drawn from it, and the argument about how the global economy and therefore investing is likely to change were well made. The surprising part is that the world is now moving in the direction he pointed to a few years ago. No one can predict the future. But it is better to have an idea of the likely scenarios. Worth reading.

Around 15 months ago the Finance Ministry said claims that MDR would be charged on UPI were "completely false, baseless and misleading, and reaffirmed its commitment to promoting digital payments through UPI." Today there is a U turn. From 15 October a 0.4% MDR will apply to specified person to merchant UPI transactions above Rs 2,000. When STT was introduced, Parliament was told it was in lieu of capital gains tax on listed equities. We now pay both STT and capital gains tax. Dividends, once taxed at the company level, are now taxed in shareholders hands at slab rates. What happened to Dream11? Courts treated fantasy sports as a game of skill. Rules were later framed for permissible real money games. Then a law banned online money games. Who allowed it, who banned it, and what material change occurred in those few years? The problem is consistency and credibility. That is why so many people keep questioning official GDP growth rate to inflation numbers. If the government had enough credibility, this level of scepticism would not exist.

Top 10% of Indians earn 57% of national income. The remaining 90% earn 43%. GDP per capita of India is about $2,700. If you set aside the top 10%, the balance 90% has an implied GDP per capita of only about $1,300. That is below the national averages of Pakistan and sub Saharan Africa. It shows how much the national average is pulled up by the top. If you are not among the top 150 million and are part of the remaining 1.3 billion, daily life is extremely hard for a very large share of people. Because 150 million is itself a huge number, the country looks more prosperous than it is for most citizens. As the Indus Valley report from Blume Ventures pointed out, around 1,000 million Indians have almost no room to spend beyond very basic needs. They are not a market for discretionary goods. Public support matters a great deal for survival at that level. As a country, we have a very long way to go. Loving the country does not mean ignoring reality. Some people say that in every country only the top 10% thrive and the rest struggle. That does not make India typical. India is unusual in both the depth of poverty and the concentration of income. I mentioned that the top 10% of Indians earn about 57% of national income. In countries such as Germany, Italy, Japan, South Korea and France, household survey data put the top 10% closer to around 25% of national income. Even in the United States, survey data put that share near 30%. Below are approximate GDP per capita figures for 10 large rich countries. The first number is the national average, meaning total income of the country divided by its whole population. The second number is a rough figure for the bottom 90%, meaning what the average looks like if you leave out the richest tenth. In these countries the second number stays high. In India it collapses. United States: $89,105 and $68,800 Germany: $55,911 and $47,100 United Kingdom: $54,949 and $45,100 Canada: $53,558 and $45,800 France: $46,792 and $41,200 South Korea: $34,642 and $28,000 Japan: $33,956 and $27,900 Italy: $41,091 and $33,700 Australia: $64,547 and $52,300 Spain: $36,192 and $31,900 We not only create less income and wealth per person, and what we create is far more concentrated.