Tuesday, November 01, 2011
Thought of the moment: The future success of china
Many commentators are saying that the current increase in the wealth/success of china is going to continue in the near future, and it will eclipse the West. However, it seems to me that the recent economic success of China is predicated mainly on providing cheap manufacturing labour. But theres only so far that you can ride that train. What happens when wages go up? The owners of the companies will move the factories elsewhere, chasing the cheapest labour. What happens when robotic labour truly takes over from humans? The companies will then literally own the workers/
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2 comments:
Already happening. Nike moved to Vietnam from China for cheaper labor and Foxconn wants to replace its employees with robots. China is gaining only via cheap labor, environmental abuse, and pegged currency rates. They can't keep that up forever though.
Already they are losing their competitive advantage to other South Eastern nations such as Singapore, Vietnam, Cambodia and Thailand.
China still has a long way to transform its barbaric populace into a civilized service based society.
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