As an emerging market, Pakistan faces a growing intensity of income inequalities between its rural and urban and skilled and unskilled workforce. The immediate impact of the structural reforms and the worsening unemployment have further widened the income gap between the rich and poor.

The government’s initiatives to redress inequalities by providing subsidies, safety-nets, special schemes and allocations for disadvantaged population, continue to add to fiscal deficit and they are obviously in conflict with the market-driven path to economic growth.

No doubt, in the scenario of galloping food inflation and rise in core inflation, it is expected of government to increase subsidies and safety nets for economically deprived population.

Yet to achieve real economic growth, it is incumbent upon government to redress income inequalities by putting in place a permanent mechanism of enabling environment for the disadvantaged, giving them access to quality education, new technologies, preventive and health care for the development of a skilled and energetic workforce,

This has to be reinforced by the availability of institutional credit, market access and, of course, minimum safety nets at the initial stage to encourage the less fortunate to traverse entrepreneurial path. The approach should be for creating opportunities for the down- trodden rather than addressing their issues through ad- hoc solutions.

The have-nots have to be provided level playing field to purge inequalities and for that the government needs to divert all resources for human capital development, needed infrastructure to do business, institutional finance and marketing outlets. Providing subsidies and temporary financial and food assistance through Baitul Mal etc is not the answer to a complex problem.

Further, a person’s life prospects should not be influenced by his/her peculiar circumstances in which he/she lives. One’s area of birth, gender, race and family origin should never be a deciding factor for his/her capabilities. The outcome of providing enabling environment may differ substantially from individual to individual as a consequence of difference in efforts, talent and, of course, luck. It is essential that policies to create enabling environment should be area and community-specific.

The creation of the local government has proved helpful and likely to prove more effective if things are planned and implemented at the council level, keeping in view social, cultural norms and workers’ capabilities, natural resources and social strength of each tehsil/town/community.

In this context, infrastructure development initiatives by local governments, particularly construction of roads, motorways, flyovers and under passes, regular water supply arrangements at least in metropolitan cities have helped not only providing employment to thousands of skilled and unskilled workers, but also has eased the problem of supply of civic amenities to poorest of the poor.

For effective management of social sector, it is recommended that education up to secondary level and health care management be made a preserve of local governments to ensure proper monitoring and supervision.

The experience of all low income developing countries has shown that even foreign assistance received for alleviation of poverty has failed to bring desired results. The impulse to generate sustained development must come from within, not from outside. There should be state-led initiatives for developing such a growth strategy, which provides level playing field for all.

No doubt, the focus on labour-intensive industries provide immediate solution for creating employment opportunity. There is a need to promote small scale and micro-enterprises for acquiring the required infrastructure and a wider outreach of the specialised financial institutions like SME’ banks and micro finance banks. This will promote not only social justice, but will accelerate economic growth rate.

For arresting growing inequalities, there is also the need to expand access to justice, resources and assets for a just, free and fair market environment where cartels and monopolies do not exist. For that all ethics of good governance need to be observed.

In order to improve labour market by creating jobs for both skilled and unskilled labour, the labour laws providing job protection will have to be reviewed. An entrepreneur would not invest in a venture where he / she comes across a workforce where he feels that he/she has hired them for life and even in case of compelling circumstances, it will not be possible to lay off unwanted staff.

No doubt, there should be minimum safety nets available for workers to fall back upon if they loose the job. In other words, a proper mechanism should be in place to ensure labour market flexibility.

At the same time, there is need to design more conducive fiscal and monetary policies in order to provide room to private sector to carry on their business ventures smoothly,

Tax/tariff structure need to be modified, no doubt, according to needs of business class, but most importantly for promoting social justice.

In order to move towards market economy effectively, the feudal system will have to be curbed through effective land reforms. Political inequalities have impacted all spheres of social life.

Despite macro economic turnaround achieved in last eight years, benefits of a sustained high economic growth rate are being reaped by a privileged few, whereas a major chunk of population continues to live on an income less than a dollar per day.

Hence for creating enabling environment and level playing field for have-nots, the government will have to give disadvantaged segments access to legislative process.