My initial reaction to Union Budget 2015-16, live now, and in print tomorrow in Mint. In a word, my main takeaway is Jaitley sticking to the fiscal consolidation target, which make sense; but he will need to convince the sceptics that his fiscal maths add up.

http://www.livemint.com/Opinion/BM242n5faKn7XsxE68RgsO/Union-budget-Show-me-the-money.html

The Economic Survey 2015-16 has a whole chapter devoted to tax/GDP! Building on a recent special column with Praveen, my latest Mint piece dissects the ES's claim that India isn't an outlier, and points to 1991 as a year of a structural break.

http://www.livemint.com/Opinion/vjSlh6i79zBZHlJtZ4vVsO/Tax-to-GDP-ratio-redux.html

The estimable Kevin Carmichael, writing on "Pikettymania" in India, picks up my recent Mint column, inter alia.

https://www.cigionline.org/blogs/kevin-carmichaels-observer/pikettymania-arrives-india#.Vsvb5hKfeqY.twitter

In this extra Mint piece, my IDFC Institute colleague, Praveen Chakravarty, and I argue that India's tax to GDD ratio, and share of direct to indirect taxes, is skewed, looking at data and also economic theory.

http://www.livemint.com/Opinion/brbD6Tw1akpGS3um0t3CaM/India-is-an-outlier-in-its-tax-policy.html

In Mint, on-line now and in print on Monday, I argue that Piketty's prescription that India should reduce inequality is the wrong policy priority for India at this time. The fight at this time must be against poverty -- a matter of absolute deprivation -- not inequality, a matter of relative deprivation, and that can only be accomplished by focusing on achieving a high and sustainable growth rate.

http://www.livemint.com/Opinion/jcf01cYBfeW3Pn8jweh8JP/The-wrong-priority-for-India.html

In Mint on Sunday, I explore the roots of the "new protectionism", and trace it to the 1992 US presidential campaign, and the "trade and wages" debate, in which Jagdish Bhagwati and I, among others, were interlocutors.

http://mintonsunday.livemint.com/news/the-return-of-trade-protectionism/2.4.4225549255.html