I am shocked that while I was away in Hyderabad no one took on the mantle of blogging this. Swaminathan Aiyar explains simply and elegantly a little known law called the Law of unintended consequences.

The Emperor Tughlak tried something of the sort by decreeing that silver was equal in value to copper. He thought poor people holding copper coins would instantly become as rich as those having silver. Instead rich businessmen quickly submitted copper coins to the treasury and demanded silver in return. Soon the treasury was empty of silver, the rich had got richer and the poor were as badly off as ever. Tughlak had not thought through the unintended consequences of his decree. He failed to realise that the fundamental economic fact ?_” that silver is relatively scarce and copper relatively abundant ?_” cannot be changed by mere legislation.

(You cannot legislate away poverty)

He goes on to explain the folly of decreeing minimum wages. Kerala is involved.