India will remain a lower middle country if the growth rate remains at 6% annually without any rise in population by 2047, avers former Reserve Bank Governor Raghuram Rajan.
Rajan believes India will demographically become older if it does not grow fast enough. The country will face the burden of an aging population to deal with at that point.
“If you do the math, at 6% a year, you double every 12 years, and therefore in 24 years, we’ll be four times our per capita income. Today, the per capita income in India, as you know, is just a little below $2,500 per person multiply by four, we get $10,000 per person…So if you do the math, at our current rate of growth, you know, strong as it is highest in the G20, we don’t get rich but we stay lower middle income till 2047,” he during a programme organised by Manthan in Hyderabad,
The former RBI chief has pointed out that some southern states are growing in population at below reproduction rate. The fertility rate, he believes, has fallen below reproduction rate thus slowing the growth.
“In other words, we will start the process of aging at some point around that time, which leads to the alarming question if we don’t grow faster, we will grow old before we grow rich, which means we all have all the burdens of an aging population to deal with also at that point,” he was quoted as saying by The Indian Express.
He feels the current pace of growth is not sufficient to employ those getting into the labour force and inadequate to make the country rich before it gets old.
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