{"id":2524,"date":"2008-01-10T11:48:52","date_gmt":"2008-01-10T15:48:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/freedom24.org\/rationalpost\/?p=2524"},"modified":"2014-04-09T11:52:45","modified_gmt":"2014-04-09T15:52:45","slug":"tata-nano-and-the-birth-of-a-middle-class","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/freedom24.org\/rationalpost\/tata-nano-and-the-birth-of-a-middle-class\/","title":{"rendered":"Tata Nano and the Birth of a Middle Class"},"content":{"rendered":"

CAMBRIDGE, MA\u00e2\u20ac\u201cIt\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s been a pretty stellar decade so far in the world\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s largest democracy. The economy is growing at\u00c2\u00a0nearly 9% a year<\/a>, GDP per capita has nearly doubled, and its largest multinationals are on a global\u00c2\u00a0feeding frenzy<\/a>, gobbling up anything they can get their rupees on.<\/p>\n

From\u00c2\u00a0steel makers<\/a>\u00c2\u00a0and\u00c2\u00a0aluminum manufacturers<\/a>\u00c2\u00a0to\u00c2\u00a0fabled liquor empires<\/a>\u00c2\u00a0and Britain\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s beloved\u00c2\u00a0Tetley Tea<\/a>, corporate India is expanding aggressively in its quest to unseat Japan and China, Asia\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s two incumbent economic powers. Perhaps not surprisingly, capitalism suits the former British colony well \u00e2\u20ac\u201d at least\u00c2\u00a0in the aggregate<\/a>\u00c2\u00a0\u00e2\u20ac\u201d and with the birth of\u00c2\u00a0the world\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s cheapest car<\/a>\u00c2\u00a0and\u00c2\u00a0a play for Ford\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s premium European business<\/a>, Tata looks set to usher in a new era of Indian industrial leadership.<\/p>\n

It isn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t just that the Nano will cost a symbolic 1 lakh (US$2500) , or that its 33 horsepower engine will reach speeds of 65 miles an hour, or that transportation in India will be revolutionized in ways that inventors of the\u00c2\u00a0Segway only dreamed<\/a>. More important than the car itself is its underlying\u00c2\u00a0raison d\u00e2\u20ac\u2122etre<\/em>: the emergence of India\u00e2\u20ac\u2122sswelling middle class<\/a>, set to grow from 50 million today to nearly 600 million by 2025. Following similar demographic and economic trends in China, these first-generation middle class consumers will fuel the next cycle of global economic growth for automobiles, electronics, mass media, food, and pretty much everything else we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve come to take for granted over the last fifty years.<\/p>\n

The story isn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t all roses, but the challenges of sustainable and responsible economic development are slowly being addressed. Technological advances in agriculture, structural advances in micro-finance and micro-capitalism, infrastructural developments within and between major urban centres, and demographic trends will continue to fuel investment and innovation across the continent.<\/p>\n

That said, for those of us living in the peaceful economic bosom of the G8, India\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s latest foray into industrial design and manufacturing could spell the beginning of the end of heavy industry in Western markets, and fuel the push to reinvent the economies of the developed world. Traditionally, systemic shifts of this magnitude involved\u00c2\u00a0sizeable labour migrations<\/a>\u00c2\u00a0and ultimately some measure of\u00c2\u00a0political instability<\/a>.<\/p>\n

One can only hope that Canadian policymakers \u00e2\u20ac\u201d particularly in auto-dependent Ontario \u00e2\u20ac\u201d are students of economic history and move to educate and innovate away from their 20th century manufacturing addictions before the knowledge-based industries of the future are too far out of reach.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

CAMBRIDGE, MA\u00e2\u20ac\u201cIt\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s been a pretty stellar decade so far in the world\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s largest democracy. The economy is growing at\u00c2\u00a0nearly 9% a year, GDP per capita has nearly doubled, and its largest multinationals are on a global\u00c2\u00a0feeding frenzy, gobbling up anything they can get their rupees on. From\u00c2\u00a0steel makers\u00c2\u00a0and\u00c2\u00a0aluminum manufacturers\u00c2\u00a0to\u00c2\u00a0fabled liquor empires\u00c2\u00a0and Britain\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s beloved\u00c2\u00a0Tetley Tea, corporate […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2525,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"_s2mail":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2,12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2524","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-finance-economics","category-history-society"],"yoast_head":"\nTata Nano and the Birth of a Middle Class - The Rational Post<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/freedom24.org\/rationalpost\/tata-nano-and-the-birth-of-a-middle-class\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Tata Nano and the Birth of a Middle Class - The Rational Post\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"CAMBRIDGE, MA\u00e2\u20ac\u201cIt\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s been a pretty stellar decade so far in the world\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s largest democracy. 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