this interesting factoid some time back.

America's Poorest 5% = India's Richest 5%



http://mjperry.blogspot.com/2011/01/americas-poor-indias-richest.html

for a dollar than in the US. when i visited a few years ago we could go to very nice restaurants for cheap(based on US dollars and spending). but an uncle who went with us saw the bill thought it was very expensive .

just like how you can buy a far decent size home for much less than some small shack in Los Angeles.

the problem in india is the distribution in wealth. it's much more extreme than in the united states. there is also a lot more corruption involving public officials.

Most of the "regulatory" structure in India goes to protecting private interests who benefit from the economic status quo. it is much like how Big Business lobbyists here make sure regulations are written in a way that drives small businesses out of business. You you are a small businessperson in India you almost have to get a license to take a shit.

According to Indian census data -- available here -- population went from about 361 million in 1951 (soon after independence) to about 1.03 billion in 2001. Over that period, India needed to triple its GDP just to maintain the same average GDP per capita, regardless of distribution issues.

AFAIK it's correct to argue that Indian society is very unequal, and that greater equality would lead to a reduction in poverty. Nevertheless, that's not the whole story. The IMF provides figures for GDP and GDP per capita, both in nominal amounts and with the PPP adjustment. (Using PPP, or purchasing power parity -- see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Purchasing_power_parity -- is to correct for the lack of comparability noted by JI7 in #7.) In 2012, India's GDP per capita -- the amount each person would get if the distribution of income were perfectly equal -- was just under $4,000 per year with the PPP adjustment. (See http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/weo/2012/01/weodata/weorept.aspx?pr.x=51&pr.y=6&sy=2009&ey=2012&scsm=1&ssd=1&sort=country&ds=.&br=1&c=534&s=NGDPD%2CNGDPDPC%2CPPPGDP%2CPPPPC%2CLP&grp=0&a= for the IMF data.)

The PPP is normed to the U.S. economy. Therefore, with perfect equality of income distribution, the average Indian family of four would have the goods and services that would cost an American family about $16,000 per year. For hundreds of millions of people in India, that would be an improvement, but they'd still be among the least well off populations in the world.