Helicopter Money: A Preliminary Appraisal

Helicopter money is a monetary policy tool to boost spending levels in an economy experiencing low nominal demand, deflation and high debt to GDP ratio. It is the monetary financing of fiscal deficits, in a strict sense of “seigniorage”, in order to reach the inflation and the growth targets in the economy. We critically review in this paper how helicopter money is carried out through direct transfers to the public, or through a “fiscal stimulus” (tax cut or public expenditure boost). Helicopter drops are gaining relevance today in context of the non-efficaciousness of orthodox monetary policy tools like Quantitative Easing (QE) and the persistently low demand levels in the economies. However, the political economy determinants, the macroeconomic policy context and the fiscal-monetary policy linkages are crucial in the effective implementation of helicopter money and it is indeed challenging. When fiscal consolidation strategies adopt public expenditure compression rather than tax buoyancy to reach the rule-based fiscal policies and in turn its adverse consequences on economic growth - which has started showing up in growth downturn - a re-look into the plausible financing patterns of deficit and new monetary policy tools is refreshing

Helicopter Money: A Preliminary Appraisal

Helicopter money is a monetary policy tool to boost spending levels in an economy experiencing low nominal demand, deflation and high debt to GDP ratio. It is the monetary financing of fiscal deficits, in a strict sense of “seigniorage”, in order to reach the inflation and the growth targets in the economy. We critically review in this paper how helicopter money is carried out through direct transfers to the public, or through a “fiscal stimulus” (tax cut or public expenditure boost). Helicopter drops are gaining relevance today in context of the non-efficaciousness of orthodox monetary policy tools like Quantitative Easing (QE) and the persistently low demand levels in the economies. However, the political economy determinants, the macroeconomic policy context and the fiscal-monetary policy linkages are crucial in the effective implementation of helicopter money and it is indeed challenging. When fiscal consolidation strategies adopt public expenditure compression rather than tax buoyancy to reach the rule-based fiscal policies and in turn its adverse consequences on economic growth - which has started showing up in growth downturn - a re-look into the plausible financing patterns of deficit and new monetary policy tools is refreshing

Digital Innovations in Public Finance: An Efficient Use of Resources

Digital innovations in fiscal policy is the du jour for the macro policy makers, especially in the post-demonetisation India. India showcases the early three experiments of digitization in public finance – especially financial inclusion through digital financial services - in the recent Economic Survey. It highlights that digitization in public finance helped the government to identify the beneficiaries correctly given the technology it uses. It also helped in the removal of ghost beneficiaries and thus plugged leakages and identification errors. An early figure suggests that digitization in public finances in India has helped to transfer the benefits of welfare programmes to extent of 41% in MGNREGS, 37% in PAHAL (the LPG subsidy scheme), 14% in National Social Assistance Program(NSAP) and 7% in national scholarship schemes.(Economic Survey of India, 2015-16). Yet another successful experiment in digitization of fiscal policy is the new scheme, Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana. It has ensured financial inclusion in financial services through opening savings accounts by the masses so that the money is transferred to the genuine beneficiaries. Another related experiment has been the introduction of Aadhaar cards which provides a unique online identity to each individual in the country and has been linked to bank accounts and mobile numbers in order to ease transactions. Greater use of mobile banking to transfer funds faster and to solve the last mile banking problem has also been encouraged. The use of Jan Dhan accounts, Aadhaar cards and Mobile Banking has helped India take a step closer to the digital revolution that awaits it. Such global experiments of digitization in finance have happened in Kenya, where geospatial surveys were used to decipher how much financial institutions have responded to an increasingly digitizing environment

Business Taxation in an Emerging Economy: Analysing Corporate Tax Incidence

This paper estimates the incidence of corporate taxes in an emerging economy –India- using the data from 5,666 business firms listed in the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) and the National Stock Exchange of India (NSE) for the period 2000-15. Using the dynamic panel models, we find that capital bear the burden of corporate taxation relatively more than the labour. Our findings highlight that the burden of corporate tax is more on capital than labour. It is also found that the effective tax rate is higher for the small corporate firms than the gigantic firms. Further research is required to understand whether less incidence of corporate taxation on wages in India is due to profit shifting

Digital Innovations in Public Finance: An Efficient Use of Resources

Digital innovations in fiscal policy is the du jour for the macro policy makers, especially in the post-demonetisation India. India showcases the early three experiments of digitization in public finance – especially financial inclusion through digital financial services - in the recent Economic Survey. It highlights that digitization in public finance helped the government to identify the beneficiaries correctly given the technology it uses. It also helped in the removal of ghost beneficiaries and thus plugged leakages and identification errors. An early figure suggests that digitization in public finances in India has helped to transfer the benefits of welfare programmes to extent of 41% in MGNREGS, 37% in PAHAL (the LPG subsidy scheme), 14% in National Social Assistance Program(NSAP) and 7% in national scholarship schemes.(Economic Survey of India, 2015-16). Yet another successful experiment in digitization of fiscal policy is the new scheme, Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana. It has ensured financial inclusion in financial services through opening savings accounts by the masses so that the money is transferred to the genuine beneficiaries. Another related experiment has been the introduction of Aadhaar cards which provides a unique online identity to each individual in the country and has been linked to bank accounts and mobile numbers in order to ease transactions. Greater use of mobile banking to transfer funds faster and to solve the last mile banking problem has also been encouraged. The use of Jan Dhan accounts, Aadhaar cards and Mobile Banking has helped India take a step closer to the digital revolution that awaits it. Such global experiments of digitization in finance have happened in Kenya, where geospatial surveys were used to decipher how much financial institutions have responded to an increasingly digitizing environment

Who Bears the Corporate Tax Incidence? Empirical Evidence from India

Against the backdrop of corporate tax policy changes in India, the paper attempts to measure the incidence of corporate income tax in India under a general equilibrium setting. Using seemingly uncorrelated regression coefficients and dynamic panel estimates, we tried to analyze both the relative burden of corporate tax borne by capital and labor and the efficiency effects of corporate income tax. The data for the study is compiled from corporate firms listed on the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) and the National Stock Exchange of India (NSE) for the period 2000–15. Our empirical estimates suggest that in India capital bears more of the burden of corporate taxes than labor. However, the results vary with different proxies of capital used in the models. Though it is contrary to the Harberger (1962) hypothesis that the burden of corporate tax is shifted to labor rather than capital, it confirms the existing empirical results in the context of India

Who Bears the Corporate Tax Incidence? Empirical Evidence from India

Against the backdrop of corporate tax policy changes in India, the paper attempts to measure the incidence of corporate income tax in India under a general equilibrium setting. Using seemingly uncorrelated regression coefficients and dynamic panel estimates, we tried to analyze both the relative burden of corporate tax borne by capital and labor and the efficiency effects of corporate income tax. The data for the study is compiled from corporate firms listed on the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) and the National Stock Exchange of India (NSE) for the period 2000–15. Our empirical estimates suggest that in India capital bears more of the burden of corporate taxes than labor. However, the results vary with different proxies of capital used in the models. Though it is contrary to the Harberger (1962) hypothesis that the burden of corporate tax is shifted to labor rather than capital, it confirms the existing empirical results in the context of India

First reported case of Alcaligenes faecalis isolated from bronchoalveolar lavage in a patient with dengue hemorrhagic fever

Bacterial co-infections have been reported in association with dengue fever (DF) and can exacerbate dengue infections. However, DF with acute respiratory distress syndrome and co-infection with Alcaligenes faecalis (A. faecalis) has not been reported earlier. Most infections caused by A. faecalis are opportunistic. Urinary tract infection, bacterial keratitis, postoperative endophthalmitis, skin and soft tissue infections, bacteremia, meningitis, wound infections, and peritonitis in patients undergoing peritoneal dialysis have been described in association with A. faecalis. A. faecalis, a Gram-negative environmental organism rarely cause significant infections. Treatment can be difficult in some cases due to the high level of resistance to commonly used antibiotics. We report a case of fatal bronchopneumonia caused by extensively drug resistance A. faecalis in a patient of dengue hemorrhagic fever

Erector spinae plane block as a potential analgesic option in acute pancreatitis

Pain management in patients with acute pancreatitis (AP) is mostly dominated by intravenous opioids. Besides their side effects, opioids also prolong the intensive care unit stay of the patient. The ultrasound-guided erector spinae plane block (ESPB) is an established intervention for postoperative analgesia. It is now also being studied for providing pain relief in AP. A lower thoracic ESPB targets sympathetic nerve fibers in addition to the dorsal and ventral rami through local anesthetic spread to the paravertebral space to provide both visceral and somatic analgesia. It could be an effective adjuvant as a part of multimodal analgesia and may significantly reduce overall opioid usage. We describe a case of AP where significant pain relief was achieved after administering a single-shot ESPB

Chemically Functionalized Gold Nanosphere-Blended Nematic Liquid Crystals for Photonic Applications

A demand for functional materials that are capable of tailoring light-emissive properties has apparently been rising nowadays substantially for their utilization in organic optoelectronic devices. Motivated by such promising characteristics, we present highly emissive as well as aggregation-induced emission (AIE) electroluminescent composite systems composed of a nematic liquid crystals (NLC) blended with polyethylene-functionalized gold nanospheres (GNSs). The major findings of this study include superior electro-optical properties such as threshold voltage reduction by around 24%. The fall time is reduced by 11.50, 30.33, 49.33, and 63.17% respectively, and rotational viscosity is reduced by 13.86, 32.77, 36.97, and 49.58% for 5.0 × 1011, 5.0 × 1012, 2.5 × 1013, and 5.0 × 1013 number of GNS-blended liquid crystal (LC) cells. The increased UV absorbance and greatly enhanced luminescence properties have been attributed to surface plasmon resonance near the surface of GNSs and AIE effect risen due to agglomeration of the capping agent with the NLC molecules respectively, and these characteristics make them suitable for new-age display applications