Issues in Malaysian economy. Sontoloyo series 89.

1. Let's call these people,the NeoKeynes. Their mantra: spend baby spend.

2. The chief of the bureaucratic brahmins at the MOF, goes before Nana non and says:-

3. Sir, we have a plan to say under your watch, the tata kelola of the country's finances is thebestest

4. People will be saying, the country's finances has been the best under that mamak padukang. Amma!

5. Stirred by curiosity the PM asked, how? Lagu mana?

6. The chief brahmin probably the KSU said, we manipulate this concept of deficit.

7. The PM puts down the novel by Gabriel Marquez he has been reading and says to the chief brahmin, hang habaq how?

8. We hold the deficit number constant, it's down from previous overspendings and overstate our revenue. But our revenue is already known said the PM.

9. Easy, we include as revenue the overpaid taxes by taxpayers.. hey presto , we have increased our revenue

10. Because of overstated revenue, while holding the deficit number constant, we have narrowed the deficit gap.

11 . People will say, Mr anvar ebraheem is our bestest FM.

12. We have narrowed the gap due to financial discipline, practise financial prudence and are always guided by the famous good governance of the PM.

13. But actually, these bureaucratic brahmins are doing a sapura sleight of hand only

14. Just as sapura has booked in the 1b capital injection as earnings,the bureaucratic brahmins have booked in the overpaid tax accruals, as revenue.

15. The bureaucratic fraudsters have manipulated the deficit figure and so can report to the public that the economy is TER best

16. Its all due to the inspired good governance of the PM. The pasembuk effect.

17. These bureaucratic brahmins have been in the MOF for umpteenth years perhaps through previous administrations until now.

18. They can easily fooled the PM and could run circles around him .

19. The PM trusted the 'expert' advices of these bureaucratic brahmins while he may be busy reading novels by exotic writers.

20. The PM has to the defer to the advice of these bureaucratic fraudsters and will not be inquisitive on them

21. He won't be because he has not read Friedman or Hayek or von Mises.

22. The 'happy ending ' may then be reported to the public, just as sapura reported to the securities commission, we are profitable.

23. In reality, this happy state of affairs is the result of manipulation by the fraudulent bureaucratic brahmins.

24. It is therefore important, that the 1st of the requirements needed of our bureaucrats is HONESTY.

25. If these bureaucratic brahmins are dishonest, you get spurious economic results.

26. Now, lapi zhie ( hey , I am DAPig, so I speak pidgin Malay) may have wanted to expose the hoaxed deficit and debunked the overrated tata kelola. That is important of course.

27. I am more interested to tell of the ill economic effects of the spurious economic reporting.

28. But the hoaxed deficit may have other foreboding effects.

29. If you are dishonest about our true deficit, you may be dishonest too, about other macroeconomic indicators, right?

30. This follows the principle, falsus in uno, fàlsus in omnibus.

31. If you are dishonest about the deficit, you MAYBE dishonest too about important macroeconomic indicators like inflation, unemployment and even GDP.

32. Of the bad economic effects of hoaxed deficit, let me illustrate

33. Suppose you inflate our revenue while holding the already improved deficit spending constant, you have narrowed the deficit gap.

34. Or you manipulate the deficit in any manner you like. Hentam saja lah

35. Say our revenue is 10b. We have a deficit gap of 4b. That makes our deficit budget of 14b.

36. Now, inflate the revenue to 13b. You still want a deficit gap of 4b. Your new deficit budget is 17b

37. How do you inflate the revenue? By including the overpaid taxes by taxpayers which you have not returned.

38. If there are laws permitting this 'conversion' well, the laws be dammed.

39. How can laws be used to carry out a mischief?

40. The mischief is in using other people's money as though it's yours for deception .

41. The worry is now, you have 4b to carry out whatever you want.

42. You can now go out with capital and bail out spree.

43. You can do these on your chosen companies, play winners and perhaps make tons of commission.

44. Given the culture of impunity that now engulfs our society, I cannot discount the possibilities of the bureaucratic brahmins purposely going out making money through corruption .

45. What's stopping these bureaucratic brahmins from putting up cases for badly run and inefficient companies?

46 . For hefty commissions,they will put up convincing cases for the sapuras, the THs, the pnbs, the ltats, other glcs inefficient and badly run.

47. I strongly suspect, that for hefty commissions these brahmins will do their services.

48. Because of this, I have long advocated we carry out accounts and lifestyle audits

49. People are free to live the lifestyle they want . We only ask them to account for it and explain it

To be continued in part 3.