Why India?
Because India is, in many ways, like the United States was in 1900... but bigger and better. It has a huge population - about a billion people, of which approximately 200 million are considered middle class. This is more than 10 times the size of the U.S. middle class at the start of the Industrial Revolution. The sheer size of the market is staggering.
A study I read in the International Herald Tribune recently said that there are a million families in India whose income is more than $100,000 a year. That's a very substantial class of wealthy people. Many of these wealthy people are entrepreneurs and investors. And because of India's laws (and lack of laws), they will have few artificial obstacles to keep them from increasing their wealth.
India's positive investment climate and vast consumer markets has resulted in a decade of phenomenal growth. Since I've been tracking it, India has been growing at least twice as fast as the United States. And even today, with oil prices going up and productivity going down on a global scale, India is still growing at almost 7 percent a year. Again, more than twice the rate in the U.S.
China, too, has a huge, fast-growing economy. But I'd choose to move to India over China because of its more democratic government, more homogeneous population, and the prevalence of the English language.
And if I were going to set up shop in India, I'd start something in the communications or technology area. More specifically, I'd start an Internet publishing company there.
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