YouSaid · the spoken record

Raghuram Rajan

lines on the record: 74
first: 2019-03-13
most recent: 2019-03-13
sittings or episodes: 1
sources: podcast

Every line below is reproduced as it was said and linked to the record it came from. Nothing here is summarised or generated. Directory · Search · Corrections

“Indian fiction. Well, Arundhati Roy wrote a stellar book, The God of Small Things. I think she hasn't followed it up, unfortunately thus far. But every once in a while we have a great author who comes out like that. Is there anything that I particularly like nowadays? Amitabh Ghosh has written a nice trilogy on immigration, which I think is very sensible and very interesting. One of the problems, this goes to your earlier question, is we don't see much of the vernacular literature coming out in English. And there are depths there which are very, very interesting and they deserve more airing.”
2019-03-13 · Conversations with Tyler · Raghuram Rajan on Understanding Community · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Well, I think what happens is more than institutions is the political environment in which the institutions are created that matters, the political dispensation. And that's a lot of what the book is trying to say, that you need the right political structures to emerge. So take, for example, the U.S. Constitution, which Liberia adopted. You would not say that the checks and balances we have in the US, the distribution of power in the US transferred to Liberia. So the institution, that is the constitution being imposed in Liberia, didn't necessarily mean that they inherited the same sort of structure. And I would say that's true of country after country. The same institution can function very differently if the distribution of powers is different, which is why in this book I emphasize it's that distribution in which markets play a very important role that we need to think about to have stable functioning democracy.”
2019-03-13 · Conversations with Tyler · Raghuram Rajan on Understanding Community · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Well, I think there is a reasonable, we found a balance, and I think every country has to find that balance between regional power and central power. And it goes back and forth. I think increasingly what we find is in India, the states are demanding more power and more is being decentralized to them. I think this is something that every country has to work out. How much do you allow a state like Catalonia the freedom to express itself within the larger nation? And sometimes repression has the wrong consequences. I mean, we in India know that. We have had a number of states where there has been repression and there has been pushback.”
2019-03-13 · Conversations with Tyler · Raghuram Rajan on Understanding Community · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I would say that to some extent the structure we created has stood us well. And this is where I go back to the democracy. Yes, people question how illiterate people can have a sensible vote, but again and again you see that our voters make what seemed like sensible decisions.”
2019-03-13 · Conversations with Tyler · Raghuram Rajan on Understanding Community · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Well, I mean, some of that may have to do with the nature of the government, that it is a one-party system. There isn't an enormous scope for internal dialogue and debate. And I would suspect that one of the reasons people felt more comfortable with the United States post-war hegemony was the internal debate in the United States, not so much that everybody trusted the U.S. government, but they realized that there were checks and balances internally and that every once in a while, especially in the 70s and the 80s and the 90s, the public would start pointing at some of the actions of the US government and restrain some of the worse actions. So I think there was greater confidence. I would say right from Jimmy Carter, I think the, and Carter is not a popular president in the United States, but the kind of introspection that he did in public, I think was useful for the rest of the world to know that”
2019-03-13 · Conversations with Tyler · Raghuram Rajan on Understanding Community · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“It is a real thing, but like any country doing something so gigantic, I think the learning that there are lots of unintended consequences. Some of the debt traps that countries have got into as they've built out some of the infrastructure associated with One Belt, One Road, I don't think that was necessarily intentional on the part of the Chinese, but they do realize that it creates a tremendous amount of resentment. So you think people are happy because you've essentially financed this infrastructure for them, but nobody's using it and the people on the other side say, look, why did we build this? This is a white elephant. So I think there are aspects of One Belt, One Road, which are going that way. There are also successes. Longer run, I think as an important thrust in important international responsibility of the Chinese, this is an important step forward. The Chinese, I think, have grown.”
2019-03-13 · Conversations with Tyler · Raghuram Rajan on Understanding Community · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Well, we have to think more cleverly about doing that, but it's not primarily going to be the financial services or consulting and so on. It's actually construction. If India can construct what it needs in terms of housing, in terms of infrastructure, in terms of ports, railroads, et cetera, for the next 15 years, that's where a lot of the jobs will be, not just around the roads we build, but the restaurants, the motels, the service sector, which builds around those roads. And of course, there will be some manufacturing. I mean, India still has very cheap labor, so manufacturing will increase what Vietnam is doing now. India will also do. But we need to build out that infrastructure. So I would say construction, then manufacturing, and around all this, a significant increase in services.”
2019-03-13 · Conversations with Tyler · Raghuram Rajan on Understanding Community · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I mean, it is a concern, but I would argue that I think there's enough room for growth in India doing the old traditional things. I wouldn't worry about it right now. I think in the longer run, we have to worry, we certainly have to upgrade the quality of education in India significantly. More people have to be better prepared for the global economy. They're not. We have many of the same problems that we talk about in industrial countries. Too few people educated at the levels that the economy needs. But that said, I would say there are very low hanging fruit in India, which if we pluck, we can generate 9-10% growth for the next 10, 15 years. That would get us firmly into middle income. And I don't think we necessarily need to go the Chinese way of manufacturing lead growth. Maybe that option is already closed out. But just simply building out the infrastructure in India, connecting people, getting internal trade up, you don't need to go the external trade manufacturer.”
2019-03-13 · Conversations with Tyler · Raghuram Rajan on Understanding Community · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I think that an open liberal, tolerant country is really what we need for the next stage of growth. We are now reaching middle income. We could go a little faster. We should go a little faster there. Once we reach middle income, to grow further, I think we need an intellectual openness, which only the kind of democracy we have, the open dialogue, a respectful dialogue, will generate the kinds of innovative forces that will take us more to the frontier. I keep saying, and I say this in the book, we are very well positioned for the next stage of growth, from middle to high income. But we first have to reach middle income.”
2019-03-13 · Conversations with Tyler · Raghuram Rajan on Understanding Community · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I'm not sure I would agree. I would say that we've had a government over the last five years which has elements of the majoritarian Hindu nationalist group in it. But I would argue the country as a whole is still firmly secular, liberal in the Nerovian ideal, which is that we need a country which is open to different religions, to different ethnicities, to different beliefs if we have to stay together. And democracy plays an important role here because it allows some of the pressures which build up in each community to essentially get expressed and therefore diffuses some of the pressure. So I think India's ideal is still a polyglot coming together in this country.”
2019-03-13 · Conversations with Tyler · Raghuram Rajan on Understanding Community · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“This goes to the point of online is less engagement, it allows you to opt in and opt out, allows you more choice, but the depth of engagement, I would argue, is much less than when you have a local real community.”
2019-03-13 · Conversations with Tyler · Raghuram Rajan on Understanding Community · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I think you need both. I mean, look, face-to-face in my class, when I look at a student and they're not prepared, they feel a sense of embarrassment. It's hard to get that sense of embarrassment across the net, at least in full measure.”
2019-03-13 · Conversations with Tyler · Raghuram Rajan on Understanding Community · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Works a lot better. I think the internet offers a lot of possibilities. Not all of them good, absolutely. But it offers a way to stay together, which we didn't have in the past and offers new ways of getting together, again, which we didn't have in the past.”
2019-03-13 · Conversations with Tyler · Raghuram Rajan on Understanding Community · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I think that it actually helps in many ways. Often we worry about the internet. People spending so much time away, I mean the traditional picture of a family of four eating and each one on their cell phones communicating with somebody outside. But in fact, when you look at the evidence, it seems like it can also help bring together people. So my kids, for example, they are so much more in touch with their college friends through Facebook and so on in a way that we never were. There's an example in the book of this community Netville where they actually overlay internet on half a community. This is exactly what an economist wants, a randomized experiment. Half the community linked, the other half not, which segment does better in maintaining social ties? It's the one that's linked because they can travel. They can communicate with each other. They can do social events together.”
2019-03-13 · Conversations with Tyler · Raghuram Rajan on Understanding Community · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I think that at least in the way that it has grown, it has actually created more reaction than a greater sense of community. And I'll be very, very specific about that. What it's done is it's taken powers up into the union, which traditionally used to belong at the country level and within the country level at the regional level. And as those powers migrate up, people in the country feel disempowered. We can't determine everything. Everything's determined by those bureaucrats in Brussels. When that happens, there's a reaction against the European Union. To some extent, the local politicians play into that. All the good stuff.”
2019-03-13 · Conversations with Tyler · Raghuram Rajan on Understanding Community · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Diwali is pretty up there. It's the most important Hindu festival. It's again a time of coming together, a family, of recognizing your community.”
2019-03-13 · Conversations with Tyler · Raghuram Rajan on Understanding Community · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“What you see is, again, that in reaction to modernity, there is sometimes an increasing emphasis on these older symbols. For example, the Ganesh Festival, Festival of the Elephant God, is celebrated with full gusto in Maharashtra. And a lot of young kids are participating in that. They like the symbolism. They like the festivities. They like being with other people. But they've converted into something new. They dance on the streets. You know, a lot of Western dance as opposed to traditional Indian dance, they've adapted it to their needs.”
2019-03-13 · Conversations with Tyler · Raghuram Rajan on Understanding Community · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“In the majority religion in India, Hinduism, you really don't have a strong concept of church that is going to assemblies and so on.”
2019-03-13 · Conversations with Tyler · Raghuram Rajan on Understanding Community · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Some of it is, but you might argue that when community declines, people reach out to measures of identity that they can lock onto. And sometimes religion is something that they grasp at because that at least gives them some sense of who they are, because the local community is collapsing, social dysfunctionality is setting in, families are breaking down, teenage pregnancies are up, when that doesn't satisfy you looking for other symbols. Nationalism is one, religion is another.”
2019-03-13 · Conversations with Tyler · Raghuram Rajan on Understanding Community · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Well, there is some of that. There are some people who prefer the anonymous existence of the city, and there are some people who come back from the city back to their community because they like the sense of identity that it provides. We are with people we've known for many years, they are who we are in some sense. You're defined by the people around you. So I think there's room for both. In fact, the book is about saying, look, let's create the possibility for all kinds of communities to coexist within a country.”
2019-03-13 · Conversations with Tyler · Raghuram Rajan on Understanding Community · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I think the villages by and large are self-governing, have been self-governing for many, many decades. But I think what you really need is over and above that, you need the funding that accumulates at the center or at the state level to come down to the community level so they can decide what kinds of irrigation projects, for example, that they need a lot of it is local. It's not these mega, gigantic projects which create a whole lot of problems. It's about local tanks, local wells. And there are many areas where once the local people take it up and have the funding associated with it, they actually do a great job of doing the right things as far as irrigation, as far as the environment, as far as everything local community needs.”
2019-03-13 · Conversations with Tyler · Raghuram Rajan on Understanding Community · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Well, first, I would disagree a little about your characterization of China. I think one of the things they've done very well is have pretty strong, in fact, impenetrable business regulation around. That's not a recommended path. But what they've done is empower the local government officials to essentially work with those regulations and open them up for local businesses. So in some sense, they've incentivized the local officials by giving them strong rewards for growth. They get promoted faster up the Communist Party and allow them, in a sense, to build the local community around their abilities. So Chinese growth, a lot of it is not because China has the best business regulation in the world, but because it has empowered communist party officials who know how to break the rules selectively. Now, is that a recommended mode? Certainly not, but it's worked.”
2019-03-13 · Conversations with Tyler · Raghuram Rajan on Understanding Community · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I think you have to worry about that. And so we might, if the local community's abilities to enact sort of zoning laws were not tempered in some way by the other two pillars that I talk about in the book, the state and markets. So to some extent, we need to keep the borders of the community low and porous while giving the community greater decision-making power. The decision-making power is not about the borders per se, but about how it will encourage economic activity in some sense attuned to the needs and the capabilities of the community.”
2019-03-13 · Conversations with Tyler · Raghuram Rajan on Understanding Community · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“You need a new kind of structure going forward. Certainly you need more empowerment locally, but you have to make sure that that empowerment is not total, that it's not about building walls around the community, but making the community able to take advantage of a global economy as well as a large country. So walls prevent that. So how do you get people to have a sense of agency while at the same time there are flows across the borders of the community? That's really what I'm trying to do.”
2019-03-13 · Conversations with Tyler · Raghuram Rajan on Understanding Community · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source