1. Proud Filer
Of late, some Indian friends of mine have started applying a badge to their profile pictures that says "Proud Filer". This refers, of course, to the fact that they have filed their taxes. The badge shows that India's Income Tax department is trying to provide positive reinforcement for this desired behaviour. All good and wholesome stuff.
It's just a bit amusing to me. I'm sure people will call this snobbery on my part, but I see nothing to be proud about in doing what is expected and the norm. I have been filing taxes all my working life, both in India and in Australia, and I never thought it was something I should pat myself on the back for, with a badge on my profile pic and everything.
In Australia, one is allowed to start working (part-time) after the age of 14 years and 9 months. (Until that arbitrarily defined age, I suppose it would be considered child labour and hence illegal.) My son started to work part-time at a library at around that age, and he filed his first tax return at the age of 15. Of course, since his earnings were well below the taxable threshold, he paid no tax that year. This continued until he got his first full-time job after graduation at the age of 23, at which point his income crossed the tax-free threshold and he began to pay income tax. But he had had to file his returns every year from the age of 15! It's an offence not to file a tax return if you've earned any income during the year. Whether your income crosses the tax-free threshold or not is beside the point.
I can understand that in a country with a low tax base and a low level of tax compliance, it's necessary to encourage the filing of taxes with a feel-good incentive like a badge. I suppose it's "one small step for an individual taxpayer, but a giant leap for the tax department and the economy".
What other expected behaviours can one reward with badges, I wonder.
"Proud Non-Litterer"
"Proud Follower of Road Rules"
"Proud Non-Payer of Bribes to Officials"
Apologies again for sounding like a snob. I'm still not able to get over my amusement at this.
2. Jobs for Kids
That reminds me of another interesting difference between parental attitudes in Australia and India. Kids in Australia are expected to start working part-time from the allowed age of 14 years and 9 months, both to earn their own pocket money and to gain valuable work experience. The most valued jobs are customer-facing ones, since such experience is highly useful in a service economy. You will see high-school and college kids working at supermarket checkout counters, as clothing shop assistants, waiters, etc. It is not looked down upon.
I don't know what the attitudes of middle-class India are like today towards children from educated families working at such service jobs, but I certainly remember what it was like in my youth.
In 1984, one of my IIT classmates had applied for a graduate course at a US university and had also applied for a teaching assistantship to help cover his expenses. I was present when he read out the letter he received from a professor at that university. The professor regretted that there were no paid assistantships available, but he promised to help my friend get a job driving the university bus. We all had a big laugh at this, and my friend emphasised the point, saying, "My dad will never let me go to the US if he knows I'm going to be driving a bus!"
Educated, middle-class Indians used to consider it beneath their dignity to do anything but a white-collar job. I certainly hope those attitudes have changed.
3. Dignity of Labour
And this in turn reminds me of another interesting difference in value systems I have seen between India and Australia, viz., the position of tradespeople. Plumbers, electricians, pavers, roof restorers, tree loppers and others are very highly paid in Australia, and these professions are no less respectable than corporate or academic jobs. Indeed, skilled tradespeople are among the highest income earners in the country.
To take one very stark example, plumbers are most often called in to deal with blocked toilet drains, and their job necessarily brings them into frequent contact with human faeces. In India, such a job would be considered to be the lowest of the low, and the existence of the caste system bears witness to this pervasive social attitude. In Australia, thankfully, there is no stigma at all attached to this trade. It's a truly egalitarian society.
If anything, the snobbery in Australia runs the other way. In India, students who secure admission to an educational institution "on merit", i.e., by scoring high marks in an entrance test, tend to look down on their classmates who have secured admission by paying "capitation fees" or through a "management quota". Scholastic ability ("merit") has legitimacy that fee-paying ability does not.
In Australia, I have heard from Indian friends (whose children gained admission to private schools on a scholarship) that they were disdained by their classmates who were paying full fees. In a complete inversion of social strata, the students who were able to pay full fees were the children of highly-paid tradespeople, whereas the children of my highly educated friends working in academia and mid-level corporate positions were constrained by economics to seek financial assistance through scholarships, which then made them the object of their classmates' contempt.
These are some of the interesting differences I've seen between the societies of my native country and my adoptive one.
If you liked this, check out a related post, Thoughts On Culture, Friendship And Hospitality.
No comments:
Post a Comment