3 ms·

Read to the second page, especially this: Global companies like Caterpillar, General Electric, General Motors and Siemens — as well as scores of others — are m

Read to the second page, especially this: Global companies like Caterpillar, General Electric, General Motors and Siemens — as well as scores of others — are making a more aggressive push into China, in some cases moving research and development centers here. I am, personally, familiar with the movement of R&D to China. This, alone, makes me believe that this is not a flash-in-the-pan, but a genuine long term trend. Also, as I recall the original estimate for when China would become #1 auto consumer was 2012. They beat that by 3 years. So, I would hazard a guess that it won't take them all the way to 2030 to become economy #1. What will be really interesting about that, though, is that due to population size alone, they will still have a far, far smaller per-capita income than the U.S.

mkr-hn 16y ago
Over a billion people with increasing incomes and opportunity is going to create a lot of amazing things if they can manage the growth properly.
nostromo 16y ago
It's hard for me to envision it being too much earlier than that -- take a look at this chart: http://www.google.com/publicdata?ds=wb-wdi&ctype=l&strail=false&nselm=h&met_y=ny_gdp_mktp_cd&scale_y=lin&ind_y=false&rdim=country&idim=country:CHN:USA&tstart=-315619200000&tunit=Y&tlen=48&hl=en&dl=en http://www.google.com/publicdata?ds=wb-wdi&ctype=l&s... -- it's not like the US isn't a moving target. Especially if the US and EU get serious about alleged currency manipulation -- it's funny to see a graph of US to Yuan stay virtually flat for many years dispite their economic growth: http://www.google.com/finance/chart?q=CURRENCY:CNYUSD&tkr=1&p=5Y http://www.google.com/finance/chart?q=CURRENCY:CNYUSD&tk... -- compare that to organic exchange rates: http://www.google.com/finance/chart?q=CURRENCY:CNYEUR&tkr=1&p=5Y http://www.google.com/finance/chart?q=CURRENCY:CNYEUR&tk... and http://www.google.com/finance/chart?q=CURRENCY:GBPUSD&tkr=1&p=5Y http://www.google.com/finance/chart?q=CURRENCY:GBPUSD&tk... Btw, it seems China is the world's largest auto market by units sold, not by dollars/yuan sold -- which is an odd way to think about it. Cars are significantly cheaper in China.
- eru 16y ago
  "GDP in current U.S. dollars. Not adjusted for inflation." It would be nice to see the inflation adjusted figures.
niekmaas 16y ago
It's also interesting to note that China's economy is not just about low-tech anymore but gradually become more and more higher-tech. Where Chinese cities welcomed all the cheap toy factories a couple of yours ago, I remember reading a Washington Post China article about the fact that certain areas in China ban these kind of factories now. These areas only want higher (not high) tech factories to reach out to different employees and investors. The low tech (toy) companies now move to Vietnam/Laos etc.
c1sc0 16y ago
Remember that article a while ago that China was setting up more sequencing capacity in a single building than the whole US combined? For now they're still buying US-made Illumina machines, but I'd expect them to come up with their own technology soon.

mkr-hn 16y ago

Over a billion people with increasing incomes and opportunity is going to create a lot of amazing things if they can manage the growth properly.

nostromo 16y ago

It's hard for me to envision it being too much earlier than that -- take a look at this chart: http://www.google.com/publicdata?ds=wb-wdi&ctype=l&strail=false&nselm=h&met_y=ny_gdp_mktp_cd&scale_y=lin&ind_y=false&rdim=country&idim=country:CHN:USA&tstart=-315619200000&tunit=Y&tlen=48&hl=en&dl=en http://www.google.com/publicdata?ds=wb-wdi&ctype=l&s... -- it's not like the US isn't a moving target. Especially if the US and EU get serious about alleged currency manipulation -- it's funny to see a graph of US to Yuan stay virtually flat for many years dispite their economic growth: http://www.google.com/finance/chart?q=CURRENCY:CNYUSD&tkr=1&p=5Y http://www.google.com/finance/chart?q=CURRENCY:CNYUSD&tk... -- compare that to organic exchange rates: http://www.google.com/finance/chart?q=CURRENCY:CNYEUR&tkr=1&p=5Y http://www.google.com/finance/chart?q=CURRENCY:CNYEUR&tk... and http://www.google.com/finance/chart?q=CURRENCY:GBPUSD&tkr=1&p=5Y http://www.google.com/finance/chart?q=CURRENCY:GBPUSD&tk... Btw, it seems China is the world's largest auto market by units sold, not by dollars/yuan sold -- which is an odd way to think about it. Cars are significantly cheaper in China.

eru 16y ago
"GDP in current U.S. dollars. Not adjusted for inflation." It would be nice to see the inflation adjusted figures.

niekmaas 16y ago

It's also interesting to note that China's economy is not just about low-tech anymore but gradually become more and more higher-tech. Where Chinese cities welcomed all the cheap toy factories a couple of yours ago, I remember reading a Washington Post China article about the fact that certain areas in China ban these kind of factories now. These areas only want higher (not high) tech factories to reach out to different employees and investors. The low tech (toy) companies now move to Vietnam/Laos etc.

c1sc0 16y ago

Remember that article a while ago that China was setting up more sequencing capacity in a single building than the whole US combined? For now they're still buying US-made Illumina machines, but I'd expect them to come up with their own technology soon.