“The question is always – ‘which car do you have’ our parents asked ‘do you have a car?”
This is so true – one such incident happened with me; when one of our relative visited our home and was surprised on the fact that we don’t own a car. 🙂 🙂 🙂
Different benchmark to assess the success I say 😛

Seriously how the parameters of assessing success have changed: “which car” vs “do you have a car” is just one example. Never even imagined about foreign vacations when I was a kid, now it is taken for granted! Going to exotic oriental destinations is as mundane as buying bread from local grocery!

But thankfully, some folks are sane regarding cars [at least in Bangalore] – there is a lot of demand for Uber pool – that too from really well to do people.

I wonder when I read this type of articles whether Subra is satirical or just making fun. I really wonder why he thinks that so called middle class is rich and the children are studying in foreign, taking luxurious treatments, spending lavishly on hotels. It seems he does this all and he false thinks he is middle class and so attributes this to whole middle class. He often says that he doesn’t trust govt data but takes CPI so seriously. Vegetable prices increasing, eating out (i meant basic eating out in a roadside hotel), fuel prices increased, public transport prices increased, small schools also charging higher fees, real estate prices are still in the sky and people are buying only with loans. He just likes to write about so called middle class who are spending money in 5* hotels, Switzerland, studying in foreign, living in 2 crore flat etc.

I also echo Sreekanth’s comment above. I am not sure whether Subra sounds sarcastic on this topic.
The same thing happened during the NDA campaign in 2014. They tried to sell the ‘India Shining’ story by seeing all these hunky dory glib of the ‘middle class’. But the real India lies elsewhere. Who told migration is ceasing in rural areas? Come to Kerala and you can see Indians from all over India flocking the job market to take up jobs which locals are unwilling or lazy to take up.
Instead of blaming the farmers’ uprising as politically motivated, try to think from their perspective. De-monetization effectively put them more in a debt trap. People were exhorting to bear the short term pain. The ‘middle class’ can bear it with their plastic monies. But its a matter of daily survival for the rural folk. And they comprise the major chunk of our population. Not the vocal ‘middle class’.

The party cannot last long. Consumerism culture will have to end at some point in the future. For example USA appears to have peaked out on consumerism based on perpetual credit. Credit is nothing but borrowing money that doesn’t belong to us for buying things that we do not require. Right from the year 1970, when gold standard was eliminated and unlimited dollar money started getting printed, the deterioration is visible everywhere such as climate change, terrorism etc., When excess money is printed and given out as loan, the consequence is opulence and perversion which is palpable today.

I remember the first time I was submitting income tax proofs in my company. Apart from the usual buy life insurance advice practically 99% of my colleagues were filling fake rent receipts and at being financially ignorant at that time I almost did the same. When i reasoned out what I was doing was basically wrong, everyone around me was like, you’re overthinking this just fill out the receipt and sign. To this day I haven’t filled out the fake receipts rent or medical. As you say Subra, we are like this only.