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Couldn't agree more with the two points: 1. the absence of a mercantile class to foster competition and self-improvement; the sheer size of China compared with
by pxlpshr 18y ago
Couldn't agree more with the two points:
1. the absence of a mercantile class to foster competition and self-improvement; the sheer size of China compared with the smaller states of Europe whose fierce rivalries fostered technological competition.
2. an education system that fails to emphasise improving “character”.
- pg 18y agoChina certainly had a merchant class. The problem was that merchants were powerless compared to the official class, who could thus confiscate any surplus they generated. Results: (1) The merchant class is unable to accumulate capital to finance new technological development. (2) Ambitious kids become bureaucrats instead of making something people want. (Britain reproduced this result in the mid 20th Century.)
- eugenejen 18y agoThe 2nd result still has pretty big influence on Today's China and Taiwan. Most current industrialists in Taiwan were kids treated by school administration as not worthy of higher education. While most government officials holds advanced degree from North America, Europe and Japan. The absurd part is people with advance degree may not be capable in build up business empires but creating tons of bureaucrats that prevent entrepreneurs to move ahead. -- edit -- I am not sure when the confiscation of merchant wealth exactly happened in Song dynasty. But in Ming, Qing dynasties (those not so innovative eras after Song), confiscation is a huge motivation for ambitious kids to get into government system. And in theory, all confiscation goes to Emperor, but in reality emperors allowed confiscators to get a cut from it.
- btw0 18y agoAs a long time Hacker News reader and a native chinese student here under chinese education system, I have to point out that the education system (especially higher education system) in China has big problems compared with that in western countries, this definitely will affect the future of China. 1. Decisions in universities should be made by professors, not by government officials. 2. Many professors simply are not qualified. I see this a most critical problem. The top students prefer to go to industries rather than to be a teacher in schools. 3. Students should not be forced to take a course on Marxism, a course on Thoughts of Mao, a course on Theories of Deng. From my experience, nobody listens to teachers on these classes, nobody will take these courses seriously, they just try to remember them a few days before the exams. This is really a waste of students' time, students should learn serious economics and philosophies instead. It's not that we are not smart, or not diligent, it's just the current system that hinders our advancement.
- eugenejen 18y agoIt is not the problem for smartness. But a system that encourages innovators receive potential huge payoffs. As long as the system is out there, then just like old chinese saying "With money, you can hire ghosts to push mill wheel" Of course there will be wealth inequality in such a system. So it is up to people to choose "everyone lives better but allow some huge wealthy guys" or "let every one poorer but more equal". As long as the existing wealth creators understand if they intervene the system in order to keep their power to control, then the payoff for new innovators disappears immediately and the system is screwed.So they will come to understand instead of abusing their power, they should just help fostering new innovators and keep the system working.
- yummyfajitas 18y ago>1. Decisions in universities should be made by professors, not by government officials. I think this is seriously a bad idea. In principle, government officials should make decisions that better the country. In principle, professors will teach as well as they can, and do research on whatever they find interesting. That's a good thing, but it needs to be constrained a bit, and professors will not be the ones to constrain it. Read the following article, which illustrates why profs should not be running universities: http://www.insidehighered.com/views/2008/02/11/ferrall http://www.insidehighered.com/views/2008/02/11/ferrall
- bokonist 18y agoExcept that China the Chinese economy is growing at a far greater clip than the US. Perhaps top students going into industry is the reason the Chinese economy is doing so well. Remember, the during the strongest period of growth and technological advancement in the US ( 1870 to 1930 ) the research university was practically non-existent.
- poutine 18y agoChina is undergoing incredible growth mainly due to urbanization. It is moving towards 60-70% of the people living in cities from around 40-50% now. It's about half way along the process right now and will complete in ~15 years bringing it to the level of developed nations. Exact figures vary based on who you believe. Interestingly this growth stops around the time they run in to the demographic brick wall with more older people than younger due to the single child policy. Not going to be pretty in the late 2020's for China I think.
- eugenejen 18y agoI just got an epiphany after PG mentioned the merchant class in China. Big advancement such as gun powder, movable types was invented in Song Dynasty. Song Dynasty was in fact one rare period in China that had a pretty vibrant merchant class. But after Ming Dynasty, most Chinese historians judged Song Dynasty as a pretty lame era. ("smaller territory, continuous conflicts with northern enemies and finally lost to Mongol) But from economics history aspect, Song dynasty was a pretty well developed period. -- Edit -- Wikipedia has a pretty good summary of Song Dynasty. And one reason for the economic development in Song was the government loosed regulations on market economy... Does this sound familiar to anyone?