Chicago, Jan 30 (IANS) Reacting to President Barack Obama’s tirade against outsourching, Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee has warned that if the United States stops outsourcing jobs to India the profitability of both the economies will be hurt.
“If the US stops outsourcing jobs from India, to some extent the profitability of the economies will be affected,” Mukherjee told reporters here at the end of a two-day visit to Chicago aimed at wooing US investors.
Nations were free to adopt policies that suited their requirements, but the policies should not lead to protectionism, he said, adding that possible protectionist moves in the US were self-defeating and unacceptable.
In his State of the Union Address last week, Obama giving a call to bring American jobs back home offered tax breaks to those keeping jobs in the US and penalising those outsourcing jobs.
“My message is simple. It’s time to stop rewarding businesses that ship jobs overseas, and start rewarding companies that create jobs right here in America. Send me these tax reforms, and I’ll sign them right away,” he had said.
“Protectionism ultimately does not help the country that resorts to protectionism. There is no denying the fact that despite some aberrations, uninterrupted flow of goods and services and removal of tariff and non-tariff barriers have yielded results for all…,” Mukherjee said.
“Therefore, I do believe there is merit in giving up protectionism and I do hope that countries will not resort to it.”
Pitching for foreign investment in the infrastructure sector which needs $1 trillion in the 12th Five-Year Plan, Mukherjee asked US investors to access the Indian debt market through a mechanism of regulated entities with a sustained long-term interest rate.
Meeting leaders of Fortune 500 companies here, he assured them that India has evolved a transparent and stable regulatory regime in various sectors. “India is a very good destination for investment because infrastructure requirement is huge, whether it is power, highways, etc.”
The finance minister also sought to dispel apprehensions that suspension of reforms in retail FDI will hit India’s image as an attractive destination for investment.
The decision on opening FDI in multi-brand retail is just on hold and efforts are on to evolve consensus on the controversial decision, he said.
