If India is the cheapest, we should be the richest.

A map, just published, shows the most expensive and the cheapest places in the world to live in. Switzerland came out as the most expensive and could have got a whole lot more expensive earlier this month after the Swiss National Bank abandoned the currency peg against the Euro which saw the Franc soar by 30%. What is surprising is that Venezuela came in at number 3 after Norway at 2. It maybe because the government of Venezuela has no money to import essential goods and the currency is trading in the black market at 150 to the dollar, when the official rate is 6.8 to the dollar. The collapse in the price of oil has produced such a crisis that people selling their places in queues are earning more than doctors. But, perhaps the biggest surprise is that India has been found to be the cheapest country in the world. The survey looked at the costs of Groceries, including meat, bread, rice, eggs, fruits, vegetables and alcohol, Transportation, including one-way tickets, monthly passes, taxi fares,petrol price and the cost of running a Volkswagen Golf car, Meal prices at expensive, mid-range and inexpensive restaurants and Utilities, including electricity, heating, water and internet prices. To put it another way, if the cost of living is the lowest it means our money buys the most amount of goods and services in the world. So we should have the highest standard of living in the world? Unfortunately, in the quality of life index India is down at 51 position, below Panama, Mexico and Turkmenistan. It is possible that with the fall of the rupee against the dollar since last year India looks cheap to foreigners but for us, who earn in rupees, life is very tough because of soaring inflation in the last 5 years. And what we earn is a pittance compared to what others get. In the US, which is the 24th most expensive country in the world, the median monthly salary is $5,000 per month,or $60,000 per year, whereas in India the median income was a tiny $616 per year, coming in at 99 among 131 countries and the lowest among the BRICS countries. Despite such low income levels India has probably the highest taxes in the world which take goods and services beyond our purchasing power and why we come a lowly 135 in human development index. It is shameful when the US has to tell us to reduce taxes on generic medicines which have been off-patent for 100 years. The government sets targets for tax officers who then use gestapo tactics to extort money from individuals and businesses. No wonder more than 300,000 direct tax disputes, involving Rs 4.36 trillion, are held up in litigation. And for all the taxes we pay we get no services from the government. Cases of Swine Flu are mounting but we have no information as where the virus is coming from and how to avoid it. Cheap country with cheap life.