Jagadish Bhagwati of Columbia has a ton to say about how India screwed up on trade. Basically there are many trade-unfriendly laws dating back to 60s and 70s which are hard and slow to undo because they have to be done via parliamentary procedures (kinda how Congressional gridlock makes lawmaking slow in the US). Here's a good interview of his with Russ Roberts on Econtalk: http://www.econtalk.org/archives/2013/08/bhagwati_on_ind.htm...

Edit: this is in contrast to China where laws are made by diktats.

     where laws are made by diktats

Diktats implies the popular consent of the people isn't taken into the consideration by the CCP when forming policy. This is a very western-liberal-repulic centric view point and is flawed. The CCP actively considers _what_ is wanted and _how_ to achieve it. Simply because people do not vote doesn't mean they aren't considered.

Citation: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_line

India missed the boat on manufacturing but did good on service industry because the government did not have a way to control the flow of information. We say this in India - we flourish in spite of our government. While attitudes have changed (with both major national parties), protectionism still runs rampant for fear of losing their voter base. All said and done, there is hope that these restrictions combined with incentives could potentially kick start manufacturing in India - at least to the extent of sustaining domestic demand.

The Chinese manufacturing behemoth is really a thing to behold and respect.

Too bad so many people use it to create junk to dump on Amazon as it hurts the overall reputation of the achievement.

So many people on Amazon buys those junk in the first place. If US consumers did not have a demand for cheap products, those products wont be sold in the first place. So blame the consumers than the manufacturers.

How many articles have we had on HN describing the deceptive practices of people / companies building junk products trying to pass them off as a brand name? I find it difficult to blame people who have been deceived.

If that's what people demand then that's what they'll supply. If it wasn't a profitable venture, they would not be creating it.

It's a bit silly to assume that demand is the only driver. At some point, people can only buy what's supplied. If 99% of the stuff available is cheap junk and I don't have time to sort through that, likely I'll buying that cheap junk (or nothing at all).

One example is if a high quality item is no longer produced because the company or division selling it goes out of business as it's priced out of the market.

Supply-side domination/flooding can and does impact buying habits.

Oh, I'm sure its profitable, but nobody who has bought a fake charger on Amazon has demanded it. The amazing manufacturing and logistics capability is perfect for scammers.

Given that half the complaints I hear about Amazon are cheaply produced counterfeit goods sold at full price, I wouldn't be so quick to blame all of their failings on consumer demand.

> It's impossible to imagine this ever happening in India.

It was impossible to image that in China also till a few years ago.