What capital formation?
The gloomy truth is that there is virtually no movement in capital formation in the country. We’re not talking hot money speeding through the stock market but productive investments you can touch without getting burned. The President’s State of the Nation Address, outlining an extensive though hardly massive infrastructure program, admits the problem. Budget targets were being met thanks to severe under-spending. Not surprisingly, the country’s commitment to the United Nations Millennium Development Goals, which seek to halve poverty by 2015, cannot be met because government isn’t spending enough. The critical response to the speech, on the other hand, shows the root of the problem, as I explained: fear of the possibility of national progress if it spells political defeat for her enemies; and a jealous regard for the new revenues that won’t go only to the banks but also to public works; and won’t be returned to the oil and power companies by the repeal of fiscal reforms. Meanwhile, for
