The McKinsey Quarterly: China and India: Sector by sector
The McKinsey Quarterly: China and India: The race to growth
The answer to the question, "Which is the better approach to economic development?" is not to be found at the national level. You have to look at what's going on in individual industries. And when you do, you find that supportive government policies that encourage competition drive good performance. Both China and India have some sluggish, inefficient industries that are heavily regulated and lack competitive dynamism. But both countries also have successful industries that thrive unfettered by poor regulation.
At the high end of India's productivity spectrum is the information technology, software, and business-process-outsourcing sector. It's a big success story, having created hundreds of thousands of jobs and billions of dollars' worth of exports. As a new sector—and one whose potential the government, in my view, failed to recognize early on—it has avoided stifling regulation. IT, software, and outsourcing companies are exempt from the labor regulations that govern working hours and overtime in other sectors, and they have been allowed to receive foreign direct investment, which is prohibited in retailing, for example. Without this foreign money, it is debatable whether the sector could have taken off. By 2002 it already accounted for 15 percent of all foreign direct investment in India.
In the middle of the spectrum is the auto industry, which has seen dramatic change since the government began to liberalize it in the 1980s. By 1992 most of the barriers to foreign investment had been lifted, and this made it possible for output and labor productivity to soar. Prices have fallen and, even as the industry has consolidated, employment levels have held steady thanks to robust demand. Nonetheless, with tariffs on finished cars still relatively high, automakers remain sheltered from global competition and the sector is less efficient than it could be.
At the low end of the spectrum is the consumer electronics sector, which, despite the lifting of foreign-investment restrictions in the early 1990s, is still burdened by tariffs, taxes, and regulations. As a result, Indian consumer electronics goods can't compete internationally and prices for local consumers are unnecessarily high. The performance of India's food-retailing industry is even worse. Partly as a result of a total ban on foreign investment, labor productivity is just 6 percent of US levels.
The answer to the question, "Which is the better approach to economic development?" is not to be found at the national level. You have to look at what's going on in individual industries. And when you do, you find that supportive government policies that encourage competition drive good performance. Both China and India have some sluggish, inefficient industries that are heavily regulated and lack competitive dynamism. But both countries also have successful industries that thrive unfettered by poor regulation.
At the high end of India's productivity spectrum is the information technology, software, and business-process-outsourcing sector. It's a big success story, having created hundreds of thousands of jobs and billions of dollars' worth of exports. As a new sector—and one whose potential the government, in my view, failed to recognize early on—it has avoided stifling regulation. IT, software, and outsourcing companies are exempt from the labor regulations that govern working hours and overtime in other sectors, and they have been allowed to receive foreign direct investment, which is prohibited in retailing, for example. Without this foreign money, it is debatable whether the sector could have taken off. By 2002 it already accounted for 15 percent of all foreign direct investment in India.
In the middle of the spectrum is the auto industry, which has seen dramatic change since the government began to liberalize it in the 1980s. By 1992 most of the barriers to foreign investment had been lifted, and this made it possible for output and labor productivity to soar. Prices have fallen and, even as the industry has consolidated, employment levels have held steady thanks to robust demand. Nonetheless, with tariffs on finished cars still relatively high, automakers remain sheltered from global competition and the sector is less efficient than it could be.
At the low end of the spectrum is the consumer electronics sector, which, despite the lifting of foreign-investment restrictions in the early 1990s, is still burdened by tariffs, taxes, and regulations. As a result, Indian consumer electronics goods can't compete internationally and prices for local consumers are unnecessarily high. The performance of India's food-retailing industry is even worse. Partly as a result of a total ban on foreign investment, labor productivity is just 6 percent of US levels.
posted by dave at
8:35 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home