Thursday, December 22, 2016

Busy Year For The Jag!

Ten posts have been published in 2016 so far. So we returned after about a year (last time we took a pause of five years). Here's the gist of what we said.

Ramgoolam doesn't understand that FPTP, progressive taxation and spotting talent are core elements of the DNA of the Labour Party. Lutchmeenaraidoo shifts to Foreign Affairs but SAJ is in the mood for an economic miracle. Looks like voters are on track to resume one of their favourite habits.

Mauritius has far more important things to worry than Brexit. One such thing is the current Governor at the BOM. What the pound hasn't seen in 31 years we've seen here in the first 69 days of the return of Basant Roi. We showed how the Sithanen flat tax has spun public finances out of control and seriously damaged our economy. That of course provided Pravind Jugnauth with a great opportunity to bring some basic common sense back.

Mauritius is losing the battle against poverty because of the flat tax. Abysmal policy-making has transformed the economy into a machine that throws 1,000 people into poverty every three months. Little will change until policies start making sense again. The Minister of Finance fails to defuse a time bomb that is rapidly reaching a trillion rupees. Instead he presents a bland budget that will not take Mauritius anywhere we want to go. Tic tac. Tic tac.

We debunked a few myths about our excellent FPTP system. And we illustrate how wise voters are in ranking unsuccessful candidates. America can learn from our experience with trickle-down economics. The Duval Committee is like the 2014 Faugoo Committee. We formalise the concept of minimum opposition size which tweaks our excellent FPTP system in a mindful fashion to solve a couple of important problems.

1 comment:

Sanjay Jagatsingh said...

Another busy year for The Jag! with 10 posts. And we still have about a third of it to go. Will have to write a summary of the 2017 posts as the year draws to an end.