1. Large increase in registered indirect and direct taxpayers. There has been a 50 per cent increase in the number of indirect taxpayers. The growth in direct tax collections of the Centre has kept pace with the previous year and is expected to meet targets, with a growth of 13.7 per cent while indirect taxes grew by 18.3 per cent during April-November 2017.
2. Formal non-agricultural payroll much greater than believed. It became evident that when "formality" was defined in terms of social security provisions like EPFO/ESIC the formal sector payroll was found to be about 31 per cent of the non-agricultural work force. When "formality" was defined in terms of being part of the GST net, such formal sector payroll share was found to be 53 per cent.
3. States' prosperity is positively correlated with their international and inter-state trade. For the first time in India's history, data on the international exports of states has been dwelt in the Economic Survey. Such data indicates a strong correlation between export performance and states' standard of living.
4. India's firm export structure is substantially more egalitarian than in other large countries. The survey pointed out that after remaining in negative territory for a couple of years, growth of exports rebounded into positive one during 2016-17 and expected to grow faster in 2017-18.
5. Clothing incentive package boosted exports of readymade garments. The rebate of state levies (ROSL) has increased exports of readymade garments (man-made fibers) by about 16 per cent.
6. Indian parents continue to have children until they get the desired number of sons. The survey highlighted that the Indian society exhibits a strong desire for a male child. Son preference giving rise to sex selective abortion and differential survival has led to skewed sex ratios at birth and beyond, leading to estimates of 63 million "missing" women.
7. Substantial avoidable litigation in tax arena which government action could reduce. Delays and pendency are caused due to the increase in overall workload of the judiciary, in turn due to expanding jurisdictions and use of injunctions and stays; in the case of tax litigation, this stems from government persisting with litigation despite high rates of failure at every stage of the appellate process.
8. To re-ignite growth, raising investment is more important than raising saving. The survey indicated that growth in savings did not bring Economic Growth but the growth in investment did.
9. Direct tax collections by the states and local governments are significantly lower than those of their counterparts in other federal countries. The survey stated that the country's direct tax collections are lower than that of Brazil and Germany.
10. Extreme weather adversely impacts agricultural yields. The survey cited extreme temperature increases and deficiency in rainfall as reasons for the changes in agricultural yields.
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