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--- Elisabeth Carvalho wrote:
>
> I too am a free-market proponent and as such believe
> that micro-managing economies is an exercise in
> futility. However, we've learnt through history
> free-markets cannot be allowed to reign without a
> social conscience. If this persists, what we get are
> neo-feudal societies, where one group grows more
> powerful at the expense of another.
>
Mario replies:
>
Where did you get the notion that you were a
"free-market proponent"? The "However" proves that
you are not, by definition.
>
Who gets to decide whose "social conscience" is the
correct one? Is the notion of a social conscience a
case of providing good intentions or producing good
results?
>
Free market economies provide more wealth for more
people that any other alternative that has been tried.
>
Elisabeth writes:
>
> We can argue the economics of this at length, and we
> won't arrive at any conclusion.
>
Mario replies:
>
No need to "argue". Just look at the record. The
facts are there for all to see. India in economics,
before liberalization, and after. China in economics,
likewise. The old Soviet Union countries, before and
after. The stagnant major European countries like
France and Germany with "social consciences".
Practically all the African countries, which have
their own version of a "social conscience", except
South Africa.
>
Elisabeth writes:
>
> I'd like to invite debate on the social impact of
> such mass migration. No doubt, it will change the
> demographics of Goa. Is such a change welcome? Is
> it accepted because "there is nothing to be done".
>
Mario responds:
>
Again, who gets to decide whether freely induced mass
migration desirable or not, or is welcome or not? Who
gets to decide what, if anything, should be done about
any social and economic changes taking place?
>
We saw from Vivian's poignant personal experience,
which is duplicated by every small business in Goa,
that he would have either paid a huge price, or been
unable to get his work done had he insisted in using
Goan Konkani-speaking labor. Had he been a business
he would have gone under. What kind of "social
conscience" would want that across a whole state?
>
Elisabeth writes:
>
> We have to learn lessons from Mumbai and Bangalore,
> where Marathas and Kannadigas are now in the
> minority, a small voice unheard in their own
> politics. Mumbai as we all know is a city drowning
> in urban poverty despite being the commercial
> capital of India.
>
Mario observes:
>
The "lessons" are what you choose to see. What's
wrong with Marathas and Kannadigas being in the
minority in Mumbai or Bangalore? Everyone who lives
in Mumbai is there by choice. Drowning in poverty?
With electrified "jhopdis", refrigerators, TV sets,
PC's, "mobile" phones. Poverty, compared to what?
>
Elisabeth writes:
>
> Is this what we want for Goa? Or is there a way to
> systematically go about insisting on certain things;
> like proper housing for migrants instead of
> sprawling slums on communidade land, insist that
> they learn Konkanni as their language, insist that
> their children are schooled and not roaming the
> streets as beggars and urchins plying services for
> pedophiles, insist that the culture poverty that
> they bring with them is reconditioned. These are
> the hard questions for Goans living in Goa to
> answer.
>
Mario replies:
>
Elisabeth, with so many "insists" you have clearly
answered my question above about who knows what's good
for everyone else, even better than they do :-)) When
you return to India, I suggest you run for a seat in
the Goa government.
>
What you have outlined above is the exact opposite of
a "free-market proponent" who would "insist" that
market forces, which means millions of buyers and
sellers, each with their own enlightened self-interest
and social conscience, freely exchanging goods and
services at prices acceptable to them, get to decide,
helped by freely elected governments maintaining the
infrastructure, security and safety, and a fairly
enforced legal system arbitrating disputes.
>
Elisabeth writes:
>
> If we don't address these issues now, what we will
> have is a sort of social apartheid. Two societies
> living in parallel worlds. And Goa is not immune to
> becoming just another Soweto.
>
Mario replies:
>
Soweto was a by-product of a heinous and abominable
system of institutionalized racism and discrimination.
India has a secular population that could not even
tolerate the BJP.
>
India has already taken the first step in starting the
liberalization process after 50 years of economic
waste and malaise when ruling elites "insisted" on
what they thought was good for everyone else.
>
What the Indian government needs now is to give up
their paranoia of foreign investment, and focus on
developing it's transportation and communications
infrastructure, and let the ripple effect of building
a massive freeway system on travel, tourism and
manufacturing, using a combination of labor and
machinery lift all it's boats.
>
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