Weekend Reads
- Writing in the Citizen, economist Prabhat Patnaik explains how the very conception of “black money” used in demonetisation is absurd. Black money isn’t a stock of money but a set of activities and the demonetisation does nothing to target it.
- Income tax data shows that only 6% of undisclosed assets is kept in hard cash. So how will demonetisation help win the war against black money, asks Appu Esthose Suresh in the Hindustan Times.
- Will demonetisation cause the price of real estate to crash? Probably not, explains Vivek Kaul in Equity Master.
- To really curb black money, political parties need to disclose the source of their funds, writes Shankkar Aiyar in the New Indian Express.
- Rumours of demonetisation abounded in India before the prime minister’s announcement, writes Aman Sethi in the Quint.
- Demonetisation proves that like Nehru, Modi is a top-down thinker who believes that an economy and a country can be run from above, as if the government is a proxy for god, says Amit Varma in Business Line.
- Liberals panicked by Trump dismiss the idea that Trump’s victory should start a process out of which an authentic Left could emerge, writes philosopher Slavoj Zizek in In These Times.
- Donald Trump’s election leaves Angela Merkel as the Liberal West’s Last defender, write Alison Smale and Steven Erlanger in the New York Times.
- Libertarians in the US are united by opposition to government, but when it comes to planning a new society they are deeply divided, writes Livia Gershon in Aeon.
- Is there something rotten in the state of physics today, asks Graham Farmelo as he reviews physicist Roger Penrose’s new book in the Guardian.
Giggle
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