Monday, July 6, 2020

Loopholes (aka) Cycle gap la Auto !!


   Normally I try to provide facts and express my opinion on a particular topic but this blog is going to be a different experience for me since I just want to highlight on a particular topic and leave up to the reader to reflect on it. I was prompted to come up with this topic based on my shopping experience since I realized loopholes is there anywhere and everywhere.


Fish and its math:

     People prefer Fish fry vs Fish kulambu and this creates imbalance as far as how rate is calculated. Let’s assume one kg of fish with head is 500 INR and without Head is 600 INR (Demand is more); Now a trader who is influential and cash savvy may place wholesale order for 100 kilos of fish without head and end up getting fancy price of 400 rs/kg due to its volume of business. This guy visits different market and sells fish without head still for 500/kg thereby crashing local market. Well there is nothing wrong since the guy is being smart, but the problem is trade does not happen in a fair manner and creates internal conflicts amongst vendors and therefore Unions are formed where rules are formulated. Now comes the bigger problem – Union creates politics and rules are exploited in the name of Loopholes.



Unemployment Calculation in US

    Unemployment rate is a key economic indicator and a closely followed one in USA as it helps to understand health of the economy for one of the biggest democracies in the world. But the way it is calculated leaves everyone puzzled. In simple terms unemployment rate is nothing but dividing the number of unemployed persons by the number of persons in the labor force and multiplying that figure by 100; Problem comes in how we define “Unemployed” and “Labor force” – good percentage of people who are part of Employment discrimination are not part of labor force (termed as ‘Discouraged’ workers) and also people who have been searching for employment in the last 12 months but not in the last 4 weeks are not part of the labor force (termed as ‘Marginally attached workers’); Excluding these two sections from the labor force gives an underestimated Unemployment rate. By this way they keep the panic down amongst public , save money on providing unemployment benefits etc., But you may think this is more of a flaw and not Loophole ? Read the final paragraph

 

Business entertainment tax in Canada

  Basically business entertainment tax in Canada allows businesses to deduct upto 50% on the costs of entertainment. Some of the examples that fall under this category are Costs of ticket for theatre/concert/athletic event, costs of private boxes at sports facilities, cost of cruises, cost of admission to fashion shows, costs of entertaining guests at clubs and the most difficult part is how do we police such activities hence it is one of the most abused tax loopholes in the country.



Tax exemption for Agricultural Income in India

  This seems to be a great initiative to promote agricultural sector but then why do we see many farmers getting into suicide every year and pretty much every region in India. It clearly shows farmers are not the beneficiary of this tax loophole but it is the wealthy politicians who make maximum use of this one. So this is how it works – Politicians fixes a Benami person, buys a huge land under Benami’s name, thereby converts black into white, all the black money from unknown sources is shown as income from agriculture and hence gets tax exempted. Do you think this is more of a flaw and not loophole ? Read next paragraph



   Now that I have given few examples I think these are not flaws but ‘Loopholes’ that exists in the system deliberately by that way people can take advantage. Both ruling party and opposition party take advantage of these provisions and these are not kept in the dark instead it is thrown wide open to public to make use of these loopholes thereby allowing people to exploit the rules to their advantage. Loopholes exists in every region across the globe and pretty much every aspect of living like Healthcare, Insurance, Income tax, Agriculture, Immigration, Free trade agreements etc.,

 

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