Similar neighbors.

"In a recent YouGov-Mint Millennial Survey, over 88% of Indians described themselves as 'middle-class'." Kishore Biyani developed a framework which divides Indian consumers into 3 tiers - "The first tier, comprising around 30 million households (or 120 million people), has a per capita income of $15,000 per person (around Rs 1.23 million) and forms the country's consuming class." "Below them are the 'aspirant class' - 330 million with per capita income of $3,000 (around Rs 250,000)," wrote Abhisek Mukherjee. With the population of India at 1,456 million (worldometer), we are left with around 1,115 million people too poor to buy anything except essentials. Tier 1 is spending on foreign holidays, ride hailing services and "'artisanal' D2C brands", while "lingering effects of inflation and taxation is making India 2 and 3 cut down on non-essential spending and switch to local brands." "India's city dwellers are cutting spending on everything from cookies to fast food as persistently high inflation squeezes middle class budgets, threatening the country's economic growth." "Anecdotal evidence suggests retail sales rose close to 15% year-on-year during the festive 2024 season...about half of last year's pace." ET. "The US based Pew Research Center projected the pre-Covid strength of the Indian middle class - defined as those earning between USD10-USD 20 a day or Rs 25,000-Rs 50,000 a month - at about 99 million," and "one-third of this segment fell out of the 'middle class' during the Covid freeze, effectively reducing it to about 66 million." Companies raised prices after Covid, relying on premiumization, but are now seeing falling sales. TNIE. "Rising delinquencies in credit card receivables have made banks wary of ramping up subscriber additions in the festive season." ET. Over the last five years, "companies have reaped abnormally high profits on the back of premiumization triggered by exorbitant price increases," as "the acute K-shaped post pandemic recovery is  characterized by a thin upper arm and a thick lower arm; a feature officials have denied." ET.  "So, the economy is like it was during the Mughal empire - it produces bespoke goods at high markups for the rich, but is unable to service the mass market demand of the ordinary Indian due to low productivity. Rent seeking, not profit maximization, is, therefore, the goal of most entrepreneurs," wrote Rathin Roy. The situation must be dire because, "In a bid to boost demand, industry group CII has proposed that the Centre issue 'consumption' vouchers to citizens in the lower income group, which can be used within six-eight months, while also recommending a 40% hike in daily wages under MGNREGA and a 33% increase in PM-KISAN beneficiaries." TOI. This would be in addition to free food grains to 813 million people for five years starting on 1 January 2024 (pib.gov.in) which should encourage discretionary spending of earnings among the poor. Although the US Customs and Border Protection (CPB) have apprehended 170,000 Indians trying to enter the US illegally, "As of 2022, an estimated 725,000 undocumented Indian immigrants were in the US." BBC. Our neighbor is also in similar difficulties. "The world is flustered as beggars from Pakistan flood its cities." India Today. Illegal migrants or beggars - only a matter of degree. So similar.