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He also said that India has the potential to become the global democratic leader of the 21st century if it manages to tackle the issue of inequality.
The government imposed the blockade from March 25 to curb the spread of the coronavirus and has since extended the restrictions twice.
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“I think it would be advisable for the government to introduce a basic income scheme and generally develop a safety net in India. I don’t see how a lock can work without an income maintenance system, “Piketty told PTI in an interview.
Interestingly, the idea of universal basic income was discussed in the 2016-17 Economic Survey by then Chief Economic Adviser Arvind Subramanian and there was a discussion last year during the election campaign to introduce a basic income in India.
Piketty also proposed a more equitable and progressive taxation, including an estate tax and inheritance tax in India.
“India has the potential to become the global democratic leader of the 21st century, assuming the country succeeds in accepting its legacy of inequality,” stressed the eminent economist.
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“The attention paid to the reserve system did not correspond to sufficient attention to other issues, including land reform and redistribution of property, and the financing of adequate education, infrastructure and investment in health through more investment. equitable and progressive tax system (including an estate tax and inheritance tax), “he said.
Piketty, who recently wrote a book ‘Capital and Ideology’, noted that a pandemic like Covid-19 can have conflicting effects on inequality.
“On the one hand, it can increase the legitimacy of public investment in health, infrastructure and education. But, on the other hand, it can also increase fear of outsiders and reinforce pre-existing trends towards sectarian conflict,” he said.
Before the pandemic, Piketty said the trend toward sectarian conflict reflected a lack of political ambition to change the economic system and establish a system that is truly based on economic justice.
“This will be even truer after the pandemic: we need to think again about how to reconcile prosperity and equality,” he said, adding that in his book, he explored the possibility of a system based on educational justice and participatory socialism, involving property for all and the permanent circulation of wealth and power.
When asked how the coronavirus pandemic will affect India’s growing inequality, Piketty said the experience of the 1918-20 Spanish flu is terrifying.
“According to some studies, death rates were as high as 5 percent in India or Indonesia, compared to 0.5 – 1 percent in Western Europe and the United States (which was already very high).
“It seems unlikely that things will get so bad today, but this means we have to be very careful,” said Piketty, who is currently a professor at the Paris School of Economics.
The French economist, who has worked extensively on issues like inequality and poverty, said that looking at a broader range of historical trajectories, he also highlighted the key role of ideological and political change in the evolution of inequality.
“The main determinants of inequality are not economic and technological: they are ideological and political,” he argued.
Piketty’s previous book ‘Capital in the 21st Century’ became the best-selling work in the history of Harvard University Press and made it a household name.
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