Correlation Vs Causation

In a dark room full of managers, a blue eyed poster boy project manager was waxing eloquent onh is contribution to a growth metric by using his special technique. The graph was going up at approx 45 degree. Something like this.

A Senior VP who was silent through out intervened as he pointed to the graph and asked - " Do you have any graph which shows how the growth that would have been, had you not applied this technique or done nothing about it ?

The PM said - " NO " ,

The SVP asked him to come back with that data in next 2 days and present..

So when the PM came back with data, it was funny to see that the growth without his technique and effort would have been the same. The metric was organically moving northwards in its own inertia

The PM after that humiliation learned the fundamental difference between "Correlation" and " Causation". We often latch on to data correlation i,e increase in one variable over time and think we are driving it. We fail to understand whats causing it. It may be inertia, it may be some other factor but as long as it builds a strong personal case humans tend to use it. For example a person may be part of 3 or 4 teams which won but he didnt contribute at all to the winning cause. Here while the correlation exists, the causation does not.

Now lets see the ranking on India in worldwide Corruption Index released by Transparency International last Wednesday . India fails miserably with 40/100 and very low rank of 81

In this listing, NewZealand has the first rank and is the least corrupt with honesty score of 89/100. USA ranks 16 and Bhutan 26.

From 2012 to 2014 score moved 36-> 38 . Upward 2 points when there were claims of earth shattering corruption by UPA

From 2014 to 2018 score moved 38-> 40 Upward 2 points when there were claims of earth shattering war of corruption by Modi.

The bottomline here is : With advent of digitization and awareness among people, the reduction in corruption has been gradual and steady. There is a correlation between the improvement in corruption rankings i.e the honesty ratings has improved between 2014 to 2018 but there is no extraordinary jump caused by Modi’s efforts ?

The data doesnt support his glamorous claims or reducing corruptions. Contrary to what Modi claims in world forums , he has little to show as results for economic harakiri done in Demonetization.

One of the claims of  #DEMODIAPA was that it will make a "Cashless India" . Did that happen ?

When he saw that goal as having failed, he said it will be a " Less Cash India " . Did that happen?

The report from RBI in last quarter shows that amount of cash in circulation is back to pre DeModiapa levels.

Did it have any impact on reduction of large scale or widespread corruption ? No macroeconomic data suggests that

Are Indians always going to be fooled by fake metrics of correlation which belie causation? A large portion of Indian population , YES.

Why are the large number of people believing in these false claims ? There is a fundamental human behavior which explains this :

Its easier to FOOL the FOOLS than to convince them that they have been FOOLED "