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| Watkins |
Former state schools superintendent Tom Watkins, in a new column posted by Dome Magazine, is writing again about the need for the
U.S., and in particular Michigan, to keep pace with China.
An international
business consultant, Watkins suggests that preparing our kids for the global
economy should start with making Chinese language classes standard in all
Michigan school districts.
But what caught my eye is that Watkins, perhaps Michigan’s premier expert on
Chinese economics and culture, included in his piece a 2011 comment from British
historian and author Niall Ferguson. It truly provides a perspective that most
Americans never hear:
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| Ferguson |
“I believe the 21st century will belong to
China because most centuries have belonged to China. The 19th and 20th
centuries were the exceptions. Eighteen of the last twenty centuries saw China
as, by some margin, the largest economy in the world.
“China is
more of a continent than a country. A fifth of humanity lives there. It is
forty times the size of Canada. If China was organized like Europe it would be
divided into ninety nation-states.
“…In thirty
years China’s economy has grown by a factor of nearly ten, and the
International Monetary Fund (IMF) recently projected that it will be the
largest economy in the world in five years’ time. It has already taken over the
United States as a manufacturer and as the world’s biggest automobile market.
And the demand for cars in China will increase by tenfold in the years to come
“…It used to
be reliant on foreign direct investment but,today, with $3 trillion of
international reserves and sovereign wealth fund of $200 trillion in assets,
China has become the investor.”
