Tell us the whole truth
In Islamabad the other day, many political leaders belonging to the PML-N and the PTI and their sidekicks like the Jamaat-e-Islami (JI), journalists and commentators soaked in Islam and Pakistani…
Reframing our goals
Many — maybe most — of our economic goals and targets are fuzzy and ambiguous. In the case of some critical objectives we should be striving towards, the goal is…
Moving past the crisis metric
The question has become rhetorical: given Pakistan's abundant manpower and natural resources, bilateral donors and the IMF over the years, why has the country not been able to build a…
The ongoing slide
The IMF review team headed by Jeffrey Franks is satisfied with Pakistan's performance in the first quarter following IMF's sanction of its Extended Fund Facility (EFF) and its verdict is…
Challenge of imbalances
Inflation is certainly a challenge today but then growth is a bigger challenge. With the latter are associated issues of employment, savings, investment, trade, external capital inflows and the overall…
Programmed to fail?
Pakistan`s latest IMF borrowing arrangement has generated a fair degree of public comment and discussion. Unfortunately, most of the debate has taken place outside parliament, and almost all of it…
Economics or brutal politics?
Privatisation has been in vogue for more than three decades if we date its flowering from Margaret Thatcher’s initiatives in the late 1970s. Shrinkage of states’ economic presence became part…
Luck running out
On September 4, 2013, the Government of Pakistan signed its 19th Agreement with the International Monetary Fund (IMF). In 2011, it appeared that Pakistan had bid adieu to the IMF…
An obsolete agency
Do we need a Planning Commission (PC) in today’s world? In fact, do we really need a plan? Why should we plan and what? In today’s world, serious questions arise…
Concerns about battered rupee
The rupee is fast losing its value vis-a-vis other major currencies. And the country's economic team leaders - the State Bank Governor and Finance Minister Ishaq Dar - have held…
