Fahd Ali

Economist. Econ History, Political Economy, Macroeconomics. Visiting Prof @LifeATLUMS

Carpenter @Lakkarworx Insta: lakkarworx
orders(at)lakkarworx(dot)com

[Fahd Ali @econalif]

🚨New publication alert🚨

My paper "Do institutions matter? Taxation and state formation in Pakistan" has been published by @CanDevStudies. Access it here: https://t.co/Pjv1w6Mel9

#EconomicHistory #Institutions #Gramsci #Pakistan
Abstract below 👇🏾

[Fahd Ali @econalif]

My colleague, Waqar Zaidi, and I discuss PIA, its history, and its recent privatisation. Moderated brilliantly by our colleague, Aneeqa Mazhar Wattoo, this podcast tries to explain the amazing rise of PIA and then it's downfall.

[MGSHSS@LUMS @GurmaniSchool]

PIA once held a world aviation record that stands to this day. Sixty years later, it was banned from three of the world's aviation markets & privatised after decades of managed decline. Join us to unpack how it all went wrong — and what comes next. Episode 6 dropping soon. 🎙️✈️

[Fahd Ali @econalif]

My 9yo just tried explaining the solution to the Rubik's cube to me and I have no idea what he just said. Like I am totally clueless. I didn't get a single thing. And he then showed it to me. Still clueless.

[Fahd Ali @econalif]

It's been epic the way that Frankfurt lady has been ratioed. I have finally understood what getting ratioed means!

[Human Rights Commission of Pakistan @HRCP87]

🔴 Press release

2026/27 federal budget ignores labour and white-collar workers

23 June 2026, Lahore. At a seminar hosted by the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) earlier today, civil society representatives concluded that the 2026/27 ‘austerity’ budget had systematically undermined low-income household welfare, labour protections, and gender equality.

Moderating the seminar, economist Dr Fahd Ali @econalif observed that lower public spending on education, health, social protection, and nutrition would deepen existing inequalities. At the household level, he argued, changing consumption patterns and declining nutritional quality reflected growing economic distress. Moreover, at a time when the estimated living wage substantially exceeded the statutory minimum wage, stronger enforcement of labour protections was essential to ensuring an adequate standard of living.

Economist Dr Hadia Majid argued that the budget’s gender commitments appeared largely rhetorical, with responsibility for education, health and protection having been shifted almost deviously to the fiscally constrained provinces. While social protection allocations under BISP had increased, these transfers were not enough to meet people’s basic nutritional needs. The tax relief measures announced were also unlikely to benefit most women, given low female participation in formal employment. Despite persistently poor outcomes in maternal health, child survival and girls’ education, the budget had failed to address the structural barriers limiting women’s economic participation.

Labour leader and APTUF secretary general Rubina Jamil criticised the budget as prioritising expenditure that did little to address the needs of working people, while offering limited protections for those most vulnerable to economic insecurity. Developed without meaningful consultation with workers’ representatives, she said that it lacked targeted measures for contract workers, domestic and home-based workers, workers in hazardous sectors, garment workers, agricultural workers, and pensioners. The burden of economic adjustment, she argued, fell disproportionately on those least able to absorb it, thereby reinforcing perceptions that the budget favoured economic elites over workers.

Economist Dr @AqdasAfzal observed that despite rising remittances and headline poverty indicators, the budget reflected an economy that had not undergone meaningful structural reform. He said that continued reliance on indirect taxation, limited expansion of the tax base and fiscal consolidation amid rising hardship had placed disproportionate pressure on low-income households and salaried workers. At the same time, social protection was insufficient and unevenly targeted, with serious implications for households below the poverty line.

Participants from civil society organisations and networks, including South Asia Partnership – Pakistan, Simorgh, the Women’s Action Forum, the Aurat Foundation, and Joint Action Committee, as well as several labour federations and trade unions agreed that the economic stabilisation being touted by the government was being achieved at the cost of citizens’ survival and social justice.

Asad Iqbal Butt
Chairperson

A recording of the seminar is available here: https://t.co/JRUgWmg7jZ

[Fahd Ali @econalif]

4/4 Yet, the realists fail to understand that what many in the Global South chose to do when US-Israel launched their war against Iran. They saw Iran was dealt a hand and chose to stand behind it while it outsmarted the empire.

[Fahd Ali @econalif]

1/4 Now that the deal has been signed, I can say what I have been holding back for sometime now. I think many analysts in the West don't understand why Iran has received the support it has from people in the global south *despite* the regime that rules over it.

[Fahd Ali @econalif]

3/4 Relentless US interventions and whole destruction of societies. People have been, at least I have been, willing to suspend their criticism of the Islamic Republic during this time. Realists are ever ready to tell us to deal with the world as is not how it ought to be.

[Ali Aftab Saeed @aliaftabsaeed]

Islamabad City App Play Store se Ghayab ho gyee hai. Main gari ka token tax na dun, hakoomat ko nai chahie?

[Khurram Husain @KhurramHusain]

1. Sign the agreement ending hostilities in Versailles,

2. Agree to pay reparations to the other side

3. Declare victory
🤣🤣

[Fahd Ali @econalif]

You can't direct investment into more productive avenues by raising taxes on real estate. The government has to actively create those "productive avenues" for firms to invest in. Without doing that, raising taxes won't redirect investments from the real estate.

[faraz @faraz_lhr]

Whats the point of reducing taxes on real estate besides encouraging speculation in plots. Real estate should be curbed so that investment is forced into more productive activities

[Fahd Ali @econalif]

People mistakenly think we have turned a page. This arrangement is not going to last. Next year when we get out of the IMF program, all provincial governments and the federal one will be itching to spend their way to growth. This arrangement will just crumble under that pressure.

[faraz @faraz_lhr]

Generals were coercing PPP through NAB and Pinki drug smuggling cases to revise the NFC award. In the end, NFC award was indirectly revised, in which Punjab took the biggest hit. Nobody understands generals better than Zardari https://t.co/NhvV5ffuZP

[Ali Aftab Saeed @aliaftabsaeed]

Budget 2026 Watch-along with @econalif
https://t.co/yHTckjWLLy

[Fahd Ali @econalif]

@motasim @aliaftabsaeed https://t.co/aGumFiVPQX

[Fahd Ali @econalif]

Ali Aftab Saeed & I will be watching the budget transmission live & will comment on the details as they emerge. If you are tired of listening to the usual analysts, tune in to listen to us - the industry's two most senior & experienced economists and tajziyakar!
@aliaftabsaeed

[Fahd Ali @econalif]

https://t.co/aGumFiVPQX

Ali Aftab Saeed and I are live on YouTube now!
@aliaftabsaeed

[Fahd Ali @econalif]

Ali Aftab Saeed & I will be watching the budget transmission live & will comment on the details as they emerge. If you are tired of listening to the usual analysts, tune in to listen to us - the industry's two most senior & experienced economists and tajziyakar!
@aliaftabsaeed

[Ahmed Jamal Pirzada @ajpirzada]

🧵 1/n: The National Tariff Policy (NTP) was announced last year with the aim to bring down statutory tariffs over next 5 years. However, critics already argue that NTP has failed: they point to poor export perfromance and increase in imports as evidence for this. They are wrong!

[Fahd Ali @econalif]

جی مجھے معلوم ہے کہ یہ کس کے بیلی ہیں۔ اب تو یہ اندازہ لگانا مشکل ہوگیا ہے کہ تجزیہ اپنا ہوتا ہے یا بیلی کے خدشات و تحفظات۔ اس حکومت کی بساط لپیٹی بھی گئی تو معیشت اگلے جولائی کے بعد ہی چلے گی۔ ابھی جتنا بھی زور لگا لیں کچھ ہونا نہیں۔ غیب سے ڈالر آ جائیں تو الگ بات ہے۔

[Raza Ahmad Rumi @Razarumi]

@econalif فہد میاں۔ سہیل صاحب ایک تگڑے وفاقی وزیر کے انتہائ قریب ہیں۔ ان کے اکثر پیغامات کی اصل اہمیت یہ ہے۔ تبدیلی تو نہیں البتہ وڈوں کی تنبیہ ہے۔ ورنہ ان کو چاچو جیسا تو چراغ لیکر بھی نہ ملے گا۔ 🫣😉

[Fahd Ali @econalif]

معذرت پر ہلکا تجزیہ ہے۔ یہ حکومت جولائی کے بعد گھر گئی تو پاکستان کی پہلی حکومت ہو گی جو معاشی کارکردگی پر گھر گئی ہو۔ اگلے سال جولائی سے پہلے معیشت اسی جمود کا شکار رہے گی۔ حکومت کو اگر کوئی خطرہ ہے تو "پائیان" سے ہو سکتا ہے جو اگلے جون یا اس سے کچھ پہلے اک "واری فیر" آجائیں۔

[Raza Ahmad Rumi @Razarumi]

“نگوڑا صحافی کسی بھی حکومت کے وقت سے پہلے گھر جانے کو اچھا نہیں سمجھتا مگر جب حکومت خود ہی اپنے پاؤں پر کلہاڑی مارنے لگے یا جب حکومت معاشی اعداد و شمار پر توجہ نہ دے، غربت بے روزگاری اور مایوسی کا کوئی حل نہ نکالے تو نگوڑے صحافی کو دیوار پر لکھا پڑھنے پر بُرا بھلا کہنے کی بجائے اپنی آنکھ کے اقتداری دھندلے پن کو دور کرکے پڑھیں ،خیال رکھیں نقارہ بس بجنے کو ہے”
https://t.co/vS3YlfeZ8F

[Fahd Ali @econalif]

Thank God, it's no longer a train coming towards me!

[mariana Z @mariana057]

Due to the high cost of energy, the light at the end of the tunnel has been switched off.