'India is lying about GDP': Hotmail founder Sabeer Bhatia
He said that India must rethink the way it measures economic progress and prepare for serious changes in work culture if it wants to compete with China
Co-founder of Hotmail Sabeer Bhatia, questioned India's method of calculating GDP in recent podcast.
He said that India must rethink the way it measures economic progress and prepare for serious changes in work culture if it wants to compete with China.
He also called India's current method of calculating GDP into question, and for a new approach based on effort and productivity, rather than just financial transactions, says The Economic Times India.
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'India's GDP is all wrong'
Bhatia criticised India's GDP calculation system, saying it overstates economic output by focusing on monetary transactions instead of actual work done.
"Our GDP is all wrong. And I just—you just need two seconds to take a look at how they are computing GDP," he said.
"In India, if I give you Rs 1,000, 18% GST is taxed on it, and you give back Rs 1,000 to me, 18% is counted as Rs 2,000 of GDP. You've done no work. I have done no work. I've just given you money. Giving money is not work. Correct work is work."
He compared it to how GDP is calculated in countries like the United States, where economic output is linked to actual hours of work and the value of that work.
"Everybody has an hourly rate. Everybody figures out how many hours of effort you put in and you report that to the government and you pay a certain amount of tax, and that determines your GDP," he said.
