It's sweeping the nation faster than the Bieber Fever (way to date myself in my antiquated pop culture references, everyone knows that the new hot reference is KKs failed marriage). I've mentioned it as a potentially passing phase before, but I think it's safe to say its never going away. Yup. We're scared of India. It's okay. Embrace that fear. To be clear, we are not afraid of Indians, those guys are our friends! We're scared of India as a country-- as an amalgamation of a heaving, growing beast, slightly unpredictable, widely rumored to be highly corrupt, perhaps untamed and slightly off balance, but barreling full-fledged toward our unknowing consciousness.
I am here to quell your fears though! For once, instead of throwing gasoline and household objects into the burning flames of worry, I am here to say, "Hey, maybe it won't be as scary as you think. Let's just think this through." I think one of the biggest worries that is generated from India is how, with all of its positive momentum, it will usurp America's number one spot. It's scary, I know. We'll get through this together. Just keep reading.
First of all, India will grow and India will most likely be a very successful country in the future. This does not meet our downfall. This means we will have new partners to work with. Also, let's keep in mind this will take time. In recent articles, it doesn't seem that India's path is all roses and kittens. They will need to work through some problems also before they're inevitable conquering can begin (take a breath), which will take time. An easy comparison is to look at China, Brazil and India (the C, B and I from the BRIC countries--it surprises me how many people use that term but don't know what it stands for. To be completely clear, the R stands for Russia. Don't want to be a jerk, just want to make sure we're all on the same page.). They're growing economies, very intimidating.
Whereas China is growing out of control, it is currently in "copy-cat" mode for a lot of its machinery, and depends on more developed countries for a lot of its innovative hardware and know-how. Because of its size, its having a hard time getting everyone on the same page, trying to reconcile the explosive growth of business cities like Shanghai with its deserted, new and booming factory towns, and its wide stretches of remaining agricultural land. It has made significant moves forward in growth over the past couple of years, but, as we all know, those last couple of miles are the hardest. It's going to struggle with its own issues of balance, particularly as their middle class grows, demand for freer speech continues, the prince-ling generation struggles to reconcile its place in an increasingly lonely generation gap (prince-lings are how we know those that were born during the 1 child policy).
Brazil on the other hand, has a more stable population, with a population of working age that is growing quickly. It is rich in natural resources (like iron ore, timber, oil, etc.) and has a very long growing season thanks to its very favorable location (three harvests a year!). However, many of its problems are intangible. The flood of investments coming in has created a strong currency that hurts exporters outside the resource industries. Internally, they struggle in a mire of bureaucracy where hiring and firing can take years, the tax system is indecipherable, government corruption is commonplace and real interest rates are considered among the highest in the world. Its consumers, although growing and with a large percentage of growing affluence, have not fully embraced a saving mentality, so credit demand still outpaces supply. On a basic level, government entanglement has delayed basic building, like roads, for far too long, resulting in a stall simply because its hard to move stuff around!
India is very much a middle child in this situation. Like China, India has enjoyed a fantastic growth rate, but is poorer than China (bad in short term, means greater opportunity for growth in the future, which is good). Like Brazil, India also needs some infrastructure, and has significant corruption issues that need to be overcome. Additionally, India needs to educate its incoming worker-age population appropriately if they hope to be successful in the world market and internally within its own country. Anecdotally, I've heard that the red tape surrounding both the school and job placement process is mired in mystery and so many levels thick that it requires multiple stakeholders to navigate.
So. I tell these stories not to say that the US is still supreme and will be supreme forever. Already, we know that is not true, and that there are countries that we'll need to work with in order to share the prestige and the responsibility of being part of the developed world. My point here is that emerging countries, however scary, are also facing significant hurdles to define their own space. India is often the poster child because of their exponential growth, large English-speaking population and direct connections with our nervous centers here in the states (which, I think is safe to say, are located in New York, San Francisco/Silicon Valley and other major hubs of commerce) through brain drain (bidirectional) or investments (also bidirectional).
So...instead of worrying about this. Worry about narrowly missing a world where there could be even more procreating Kardashians (zing! Got it in there to prove my knowledge of US Weekly), that there is a new season of Teen Mom (WHY?!?!) and...oh yeah, that Euro Crisis thing. And bed bugs. Be ever vigilant my friends!
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