Tyrome Biggums the crackhead, from the Dave Chappelle Show. I got the DVD at that place under Crescat
Sri Lanka is a poor country where people think the government is rich. It is completely respectable to be on the government dole your entire life – study, go to University, get a government job, die in a government hospital. Beyond respectable, it’s an ideal career path. This mindset is fundamentally feudal, where someone powerful simply gives you what you need. Queen Bandaranaike doesn’t help in this department. Unfortunately there isn’t that much to give. Sri Lanka is ghetto. Instead of prosperity all we get is crack cocaine. 40,000 useless government jobs for graduates is crack. The JVP’s 10,000 tanks program is crack. Tsunami relief without land is crack. These politicians sell us crack and drive around in brand new Pajeros.
And we love them. Crack feels great, especially right before an election. It sounds great too, the politicians get to be like, ‘You’ll feel like you’re flying and forget all your problems’. Meanwhile reformists are like, ‘Uh, we have to close your school. Look at this graph.’ The UNP made some tough reforms and bought a TV. Finally had a TV in this damn house. Then the SLFP and JVP sold that shit to buy more crack. Unfortunately, crack is only good for like 5 minutes. If the government keeps giving out fake jobs and quick-fix investments then Sri Lanka can’t build any infrastructure for its children. We’re spending all our money on crack and our schools are falling apart. All that’s left for the next generation is a burnt spoon and unpaid bills.
Tsunami relief is the worst example – every day we cart water and food to the refugee camps, but the government hasn’t allocated any land for them to start real lives. GoSL doesn’t even have to do anything, if they would just stop banning shit people would move back within the 100 meters. As it is thousands of people are addicted to government support, and Queen B gets to tuck in her sari lumps and meet Bill Clinton. Somebody is freebasing prime beachfront property and loving it. Meanwhile we got kids growing up in tents.
The thing is that people in the suburbs aren’t as easily enticed by crack. Maybe ’cause they have a lawn and no roaches in their breakfast cereal, but they’re able to actually improve their neighborhoods and their kids can have a better life. There’s a certain threshold where you can use the Welfare State to keep power. The worst example is Mugabe’s Zimbabwe where the Zanu PF = Food. It doesn’t seem to work as well in the First World. If people aren’t living hand-to-mouth they can make a little sacrifice to build something solid. The problem is that the poorest of the poor need their lives to get better now. As Thimal says,
The percentage of people living below the poverty line in SL, they say, is 22%. When one considers that the last election decided the current government by a margin of 8% of the vote, welfare is used as a political tool. We don’t have the money, I agree. We have serious economic issues, I agree completely. We don’t have the money to sustain full welfare benefits across the board. Perhaps we never did. But the fact of the matter is, no government is ever going to be elected by promising to scrap welfare. Sustainable, it is not. Rational, it is not. But that isn’t going to stop anyone from promising and spending on it. People expect The Man to help them out.
The Pusherman, that’s who. As long as people can’t get a basic standard of living together, they’ll fall prey to short-term fixes that just trash the neighborhood. Long-term reforms involve sacrifice and hard-work from every Sri Lankan. Prosperity isn’t something anyone can give us, it is something that we have to make it. The government doesn’t have prosperity. The World Bank doesn’t have prosperity. Sri Lankans have to work hard and then maybe our kids can see prosperity. But how do you tell that to someone living in a tent with 15 other people? That person needs relief now, and the politicians will give it. Unfortunately, that quick-fix is no better for Sri Lanka than crack cocaine.
The concept of self-determination (through hard work) just doesn’t seem to enter the mainstream discourse in the country. I’m not sure who you would blame for this, the politicians, intellectuals, media or simply just a lack of hard-earned successes at the national level to use as examples.
Part of this mentality has to be in the use and abuse of the term Mother Lanka as a metaphor for the country. Particularly amongst the youth I can only see this invoking a devoted, caring, loving mother who does her best for her children (i.e. mother lanka is going to take care of you). Surely it’s time to end the self-destructive use of this terminology. It might have been conjured up to bring about a sense of nationhood and loyalty after colonialism but a fat lot of good it has done as mother lanka seems to tearing at her limbs, drowning in debt while being kicked by most of her supposedly-responsible children.
This is not to say that sri-lankans are not hard working or risk taking. Take to trip to Rome/Southern-Italy and you are bound to come across many youth from somewhere in the middle of sri-lanka who took a lot of risks to get there, is fluent in italian (even though it was never taught in school) and is working hard to get some money to go home and establish themselves.
Agree with ivap . Have exam on, ironically enough : Development Microeconomics soon so can’t make this long(am the only student from a developing country taking this course, it’s fashionable for the others), but will certainly butt in later. The SL economy is not founded on risk-taking and incentivizing entrepreneurism: in fact traditionally wage labour, and profiteering are considered shameful activities. Which is one reason you didn’t find a single native Sri Lankan on a tea estate till about 1951. In essence, to engage in uncorrupt business you have to leave the country, not to say that all local entrepreneurs are corruption-mongers, but (statistics are low on this, last TI survey was done more than 5 years ago) they certainly have to oil the wheels of bureaucracy to be able to expedite their routine activities: licences, tax-returns etc., What we’re in can classically be called an ‘under-development trap’ ..more soon once I return from a gruelling 2 hours.
mmm, what I don’t get is that a lot of people I talk to want to
1) Buy a house
2) Open a little Kade (little store, basically cornershop)
This is purely anecdotal, but I’ve met a few people who want to start a Kade as basic income generation. Isn’t that small business? Or farmers selling produce, or the fisherman? While I was at Sarvodaya we got this request from fishermen for bicycles so they could start selling fish again. These people may not be starting Walmart, but they are small businessmen. If you just drive round this place you’ll see rows of Kades and ‘Hotels’, vegetable stands, and fish stalls. Those people aren’t asking anybody to take care of them, they’re in business.
The problem is most of the country don’t understand the governmnet money is their money.Of course you pay the higher prices at the grocery store and fondly reflect on the president’s or finance minister’s family .Somehow the Sales(or VAT or whatever) tax doesn’t seem have the same effect.
This goes back to one of the questions you had on a earlier comment about American attitude towards government.Come April 15th.everybody have to file federal ,state and local taxes.Boy you are pissed!Thats why you see lot of involvement in local politics and school boards politics here.The participation is better than the federal elections.Even the kid who did a summer job has to file a tax return.You demand accountablity for your money .When all the things are added up ,it is not a small amount for an average person (30-40%).
Out of 19 million only about 100,000 pays taxes in Sri Lanka.It certainly means that a lot of people are taking a free ride.The local city/village taxes (“Varipanam”) is a joke and doesn’t have any impact.Why not make everybody who has a job or business file a tax return every year?I know it is not realistic to ask more money from a person who makes 3000 rupees a month .I don’t want them to pay more than they do now.Why not make everybody see that his/her contribution to be a member of the community is X% .He is getting tax credit due to reason A,B,C and D.(Like Children or dependent,housing loans,education expenses etc..).There is a payee tax now above a certain limit (25000?).The employers and employees avoid it by having a small base salary with extra allowances.(Example: in private sector ,sometimes it is a vehicle allowances.You want a car but let the poor suckers pay for the roads with money they have to spend on rice and dhal).
I know the above suggestion is going to make the role of government bigger and expand beaurocracy.Anyway since we have a top class education system and literacy rate of 95% that wouldn’t be too complicated ,would it?After all it might create several thousand jobs for accountants! ;-))
The addiction to government money is like the crack habit of Tyrome Biggums ,I agree .Also most of the people in Sri Lanka live in their own reality like “The Black White Supremist ” ( forgot the name) in one of the skits.They don’t understand that the government is them !It is their money that these jackasses are paying for crack.
I agree with Chandare about taxes, but the situation in SL is something like 38 – 50% of an economy that functions under the radar. That figure is the portion of the informal sector by share of GDP from a paper by Schleifer (1997), so about 50% of national income at the higher level is going untaxed. Granted some of it may be criminal activity, but the poor tax base has more to do with administrative efficiency than anything else.
To set up a little kade; properly license it, ensure EPF accounts, unionisation for workers, and the multitude of bureacratic nightmares that accompany, it would cost the entrepreneur vast amounts of time (at last count approx. 11 years for everything – De Soto, 1987). Thus the kade dude prefers to set up shop bypassing all of that if land and start-up capital are available and reap the surplus of being out of a regulatory and legal bull-pit. But this amounts to free-riding, more than anything it leaves the agents vulnerable to shocks and crises that cannot be resolved through a system of courts. It could exploit workers who can’t claim minimum wages and do not have the bargaining power of unions, it deprives the kade from subsidised infrastructural improvements like business line-rental and utility rates, it deprives capital markets of dynamic savings that can mobilise and further extend investment and is properly paralytic on an economy that I feel would be better off if more investment were siphoned off to small farmers.
In an economy that is corrupt and under-developed, the government will choose to pour public investment into construction and defense procurement where it goes unaccounted for, with super-high short-term returns instead of education and healthcare, where there are lower if not non-existent short-term gains to be made but will invariably push the country towards industrialisation eventually.
Chandare, Literacy rates last counted at 90.2% and the description : Person able to read and write name and address
Thanks Ru for correcting me.I knew it would be lower.I was just taking a shot at the Dark Elf who lives in La La Land.He once commented that Education and the Health Care are the only good thing that is still functioning in Sri Lanka.I also saw somewhere that Literacy rates has been falling during the last two decades ,which is really scary.
Yes, think we’ve worn out the high literacy card by now, we’ve got a stupidity level that’s unmatchable.
Excellent post Indi, and the rest of you blokes (with apologies to the ladies – it’s convenient, nothing else). Most of your arguments are spot on and I don’t wish to take on Ru vis a vis the economic subtleties because relatively I haven’t a clue. But Chandare and ivap have both hit the nail on the head. In Sri Lanka non – tax revenue is about a huge percentage. However, even of tax revenue only about 10 – 20% (correct me pls) is collected. So basically there is NO revenue. Of non tax revenue; once the bills are paid and bureacracy is funded for there is nothing left.
Sadly, the only money left in the economy is that which flies under the radar. Which makes it hard to regulate, which makes it hard to distribute, which makes it hard to develop. What is one to do?
The taxing everybody alternative is an interesting one. Why should only my mother who makes an honest living get taxed her measly salary? Why is she subsidising the five star lunch of some fat parliamentarian bastard? Sri Lanka’s is not even a representative democracy it’s a bartered democracy. We barter our lives to some sonofabitch for 5 years in exchange for a pretty election speech. It’s a give and take. We give – they take.
I’m not sure where I’m going with this because my head is swimming with legal issues to be discussed shortly at a lecture. Also I am preoccupied with the Champions League. This healthy exchange of opinions is great. But isn’t it time we all got off our arses??
Ah, inciting revolution from the Fourth Floor of the International Students Hall, London. If you send money I’ll start a terrorist wing of Kottu.
If I had money I’d be out partying men, not spending my time on the internet. It’s a terrible problem for me this money thing. How do you know where I live? Is this some sort of Orwellian Big Brother site?? Dear God.
I found this via salon
http://www.eonline.com/News/Items/Pf/0,1527,16509,00.html
dave Chapelle
Even a little dead end like Arugam Bay is affected by crack:
I’m not talking of the always available brown sugar, but specially after Tsunami thsi
little heaven of a Bay had far too much influence from the BIG guys in the distant capital;
they don’t even know that Arugam Bay is one of this island’s prime jewels.
Life is no longer what it used to be:
All night parties on the beach until sunrise every month before Poya.
The bridge and the check points closed at dusk.
No police, No STF, No Army, No Tigers until dawn:
We really partied in those days – without silly interuptions!
I hear that April’s bash was good (again) and I look forward what Vesak 3 day party is going to be like.
Life as it was in good old Sri Lanka?
Let’s hope so; I will support any montion in this decadent direction.
Look at
http://www.arugam.info
for dates; I do.
Whoa, this is an old post! I stumbled across your cool blog while working in my easy government job in which I have plenty of spare time to peruse the internet. (I actually work for a private company who lease their services to the government and thus abuse tax payers’ money in an even more corrupt manner.) My job is irrelevant and inefficient to the economy and therefore I do not want not stay too long, people should want work that stimulates them and in which they feel productive. The reason I will stay in this ‘fake job’ in the short term however is because, like most folk, I’m skint and have no alternative choice. I am always sceptical of people who incriminate the welfare state claiming it is an easy option for lazy people rather than a necessary safety net for those who are victims of a society or economy’s iniquitous whims. Even a staunch capitalist like Joseph Stiglitz emphasised the importance of welfare in providing ‘social capital’ for a successful economy to function. Overall, I think the Comments so far show a belief in the diligence and entrepreneurial character of Sri Lankans, but also an utter disgust and lack of faith in government and politicians (whereas the post conversely claimed that Sri Lankans enjoy a free ride and love their masterful government).
I do not feel qualified to comment fully on your argument as I do not have the necessary knowledge of the Sri Lankan social, political and economic system. Theoretically however, I am intrigued as to where you stand. I was interested how you compared the negative aspects of what is usually associated with the ‘socialist’ model to a feudal mindset. You almost seem to be advocating Milton Friedman style self-determination (of the Will Smith ‘Pursuit of Happiness’ variety) and small government, yet you also seem concerned about lack of state investment in schools and hospitals. Your article is excellently written, and I enjoyed your analogy to crack. However, you seem to have been forced by your own rhetorical skill to include important government provided services such as free education and healthcare alongside economically damaging interference such as maintaining inefficient bureaucratic jobs. I am sure Sri Lankans understand your frustrations better, but from my view point you seem to identify socio-economic ills without illustrating what you would like changed, beyond a vague reference to ‘tough reforms’ (– I presume those more knowledgeable than I understand the inference and I apologise for my lack of comprehension).
From my limited understanding, the best system is where wealth is generated through a free market economy but where there is a strong democratic state (‘Mother Lanka’) to ensure that the economy is being effectively managed/regulated, wealth is fairly redistributed and those living below the poverty line are cared for. A rich country like Britain could just concentrate on redistributing wealth, whereas in Sri Lanka there is still the real need to create wealth as well. This is very difficult for any country, and to compound matters the GoSL is seen as impeding wealth creation: imposing corruption and punitive red-tape upon the very citizens wishing to help their country prosper.
As a Briton I am in no position to criticise your government; ours is just as corrupt, nepotistic and self-serving. The only difference is we are wealthy enough overall as a country to ignore it, blinded by ‘bread and circuses’.
It would be really interesting to hear some more musings on what changes you feel are needed to help Sri Lanka become the prosperous nation it has the potential to be.