“I am from the corporate world”, Muhammad Aurangzeb, Federal Finance Minister, proudly stated in a post-budget interaction on a private channel – pride, one may assume, for his experience in taking informed financial decisions that paid dividends rather than what is generally attributed to a corporate entity: limited liability of the shareholders as to the company’s debts.

There is no doubt that his selection by all the incumbent stakeholders was premised on his corporate experience as the focus is on luring foreign direct investment (FDI) into the country as a means to deal with the ongoing economic impasse.

With FDI no more than a trickle, less than 650 million dollars in the outgoing year, though expectations remain highly buoyant, the question is whether Aurangzeb’s background in the corporate world has led to any marked difference, read out of the box solutions, from previous budgets in terms of expenditure priorities and taxation measures.

That unfortunately is not the case – current expenditure has been upped by 21 percent compared to the revised estimates of last year – as opposed to the budgeted raise of 26.5 percent in 2023-24 when compared to the revised estimates of 2022-23.

Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) target has been raised by a whopping 40 percent compared to the revised estimates of last year – with a 27 percent raise in last year’s budget compared to the revised estimates of 2022-23, which incidentally registered a shortfall of 162 billion rupees according to the budget documents.

The Finance Minister emphasized the need for structural reforms, a need highlighted by his predecessors as well given that reforms were identified decades ago though never implemented.

As in previous years four major reforms were........

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