4 ms·

Perhaps, but catching up is easier than surpassing. We've seen the same with Japan where trajectories were set to overtake the West two decades ago (on science,

Perhaps, but catching up is easier than surpassing. We've seen the same with Japan where trajectories were set to overtake the West two decades ago (on science, economy, etc), but when they reached parity the progress slowed down considerably.

TheOtherHobbes 10y ago
The difference is that China has made epic investments in education and training, while the US, the UK, and some other Western countries have worked hard to make education and training more expensive and less accessible. There's also been a hollowing out of independent inquiry in Western academia, and its replacement by a for-profit-only paper production sweatshop, with universities becoming corporations that have no respect for their employees and only care about short term profitability. I think we're probably somewhere close to parity now. Both systems are broken in their different ways, but the bottom line for investors is that the Chinese system has a lot more potential to grow than the system in the US. Trump is likely to make things worse rather than better. I suspect he literally doesn't understand what scientific and technological research is, never mind appreciate why it needs to be supported.
- kuschku 10y ago
  Interestingly, the only western power actually still doing something is Germany, which just started a program to invest another 200 billion EUR into education over the next few years. We might see a return of Germany surpassing the US in science output again.
  - lorenzhs 10y ago
    That number sounds a bit large to me (2500€ per capita is a lot!). Do you have some more information? Can't find any mention of such a programme. https://www.bmbf.de/de/der-haushalt-des-bundesministeriums-fuer-bildung-und-forschung-202.html https://www.bmbf.de/de/der-haushalt-des-bundesministeriums-f...
    - kuschku 10y ago
      That program was being discussed as part of the reinvestments over the next 10 years, funded by the tax surplus. The idea was to spread it to about 20 billion a year, and a similar amount being spent on infrastructure, which would roughly match the 48 billion EUR tax surplus. It was supposed to be voted on earlier, but I’m not sure what’s being discussed right now, it’s all still unclear. I do know that some states have already started investing into education, under the assumption they’d get the money back through that.

TheOtherHobbes 10y ago

The difference is that China has made epic investments in education and training, while the US, the UK, and some other Western countries have worked hard to make education and training more expensive and less accessible. There's also been a hollowing out of independent inquiry in Western academia, and its replacement by a for-profit-only paper production sweatshop, with universities becoming corporations that have no respect for their employees and only care about short term profitability. I think we're probably somewhere close to parity now. Both systems are broken in their different ways, but the bottom line for investors is that the Chinese system has a lot more potential to grow than the system in the US. Trump is likely to make things worse rather than better. I suspect he literally doesn't understand what scientific and technological research is, never mind appreciate why it needs to be supported.

kuschku 10y ago
Interestingly, the only western power actually still doing something is Germany, which just started a program to invest another 200 billion EUR into education over the next few years. We might see a return of Germany surpassing the US in science output again.
- lorenzhs 10y ago
  That number sounds a bit large to me (2500€ per capita is a lot!). Do you have some more information? Can't find any mention of such a programme. https://www.bmbf.de/de/der-haushalt-des-bundesministeriums-fuer-bildung-und-forschung-202.html https://www.bmbf.de/de/der-haushalt-des-bundesministeriums-f...
  - kuschku 10y ago
    That program was being discussed as part of the reinvestments over the next 10 years, funded by the tax surplus. The idea was to spread it to about 20 billion a year, and a similar amount being spent on infrastructure, which would roughly match the 48 billion EUR tax surplus. It was supposed to be voted on earlier, but I’m not sure what’s being discussed right now, it’s all still unclear. I do know that some states have already started investing into education, under the assumption they’d get the money back through that.