- On all levels this new book is so refreshing. It moves totally away from your standard anti-China, anti-communist cliches. And Jin's prose is lucid and highly readable.
- It addresses issues that are only vaguely familiar to even intelligent people, and the comprehensive detail provided is so revelatory. For example the infamous One Child policy. Where is it now and did it work? Yes, but in a very different way than just limiting unaffordable population growth. It's had a huge and positive influence on the education of two generations of young people due to the massive overspending by parents on their single child. Higher education is now the norm. It was rare before.- Chinese society is now characterised by the coexistence of generations with radically different characteristics. The current generation, for example, is the first to seek happiness rather than wealth.
- Jin delves deeply into the micro economy of the new China. The rapid growth in private versus government owned firms for example, and the way young entrepreneurs have benefited enormously from the financial and administrative support by local regional authorities' commitment to growth and investment.
- Corruption is being tackled, as is poverty, inequality and pollution. Social media allows free speech and criticism of the underfunding of services such as health and education. The new middle class is becoming increasingly intolerant of poor and unresponsive governments, local and national.
- Economic and financial management is central to Jin's analysis: China’s structure, with its centralised powers, financial muscle, and administrative capacity for policy implementation, has made it robust…but its growth model is reliable but not flexible. To keep it going credit needs to be pumped constantly into the economy...Whether measured by breadth or depth, China’s financial system is underdeveloped…Government intervention affects every segment...In the financial system in particular, as in the broader economy in general, China scores high on stability but low on efficiency.
- The chapter on the global technology race is just brilliant. China is a master of leading-edge technology. It's constantly leap-frogging the US. Chinese e-commerce companies are now the most innovative in the world. But the gap with the West in creating the fundamental breakthroughs (‘zero to one’ as it is called) is still sizeable. For example, in the field of microchips China still cannot make its own highest grade chips. Its weak point is talent, which has led to a dearth of basic research because of its emphasis on quantity not quality. However its new generation of well educated millennials is the real hope for the future.
- In the realm of global trade in goods and services China has leapfrogged from cheap low-end products to higher quality goods. It has moved to the centre of the global supply chain, becoming by 2017 the largest node. Protectionism, which is now on the rise globally, particularly during the Trump era, is decidedly the wrong strategy. The numbers convincingly show this. It's technology that is continuing to spur global trade (eg, online purchasing).
- In the future, China will strive to be a bigger and more forward looking Germany, with an unparalleled industrial capacity powered by disruptive technologies.
- (Jin is an associate professor of economics at the London School of Economics. She was born and raised in Beijing before moving to the US and completing a PhD in economics from Harvard University. Because of her focus on the economy she doesn’t address controversial non-economic issues such as free speech; the quality of social services like health and aged care; the imprisonment of journalists without trial; non-independent legal processes; human rights abuses; substantial military buildup; foreign policy issues such as regional expansion in the South China Sea; Taiwan; etc.)
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