The belief that economic growth will naturally follow once politics is fixed is deeply flawed. It reflects a poor understanding of economic development and a serious underestimation of the scale and complexity of the challenges Pakistan faces.

Pakistan’s growth problem is not cyclical, accidental, or primarily political. It is structural — and increasingly incompatible with how growth is generated in the modern global economy. In a world where large economies grow by accumulating knowledge, technology, and productive capability, Pakistan still relies on expansion mechanisms that exhaust foreign exchange long before they generate competitiveness, even if that was the intention.

The pattern is familiar. Growth accelerates, imports surge, the current account deteriorates, reserves fall, the currency weakens, and stabilisation follows. This is not a failure of demand management. It is the predictable outcome of trying to grow without building the capacity to compete.

The production possibility curve helps explain why. Sustained growth requires the curve to shift outward through productivity gains, technological upgrading, and human capital accumulation. Pakistan’s curve barely shifts because growth is driven by short-term stimulus rather than long-term capability building. The economy moves faster along a narrow frontier instead of expanding it. Bankers, accountants, and bureaucrats have been struggling to meet this fundamental........

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