Jonathan Tasini
Does Tom Friedman Have A Clue About China? No. Tom Friedman has written a lot of dumb things in the past. It's worth separating the dumb things that are just idle ruminations from the dumb things that are simply factually wrong. In yesterday's New York Times (apologies--on-the-road travel delay), Friedman gave us another globalization whopper that shows that he hasn't a clue what is happening in China--and his comment had a tinge or racism in it to boot.
In his column "The Green Road Less Traveled," Friedman writes:
What can many U.S. companies still manufacture? They can manufacture things that are smart -- that have a lot of knowledge content in them, like a congestion pricing network for a whole city. What do many Chinese companies manufacture? They manufacture things that can be made with a lot of cheap labor, like the rubber tires on your car. Which jobs are most easily outsourced? The ones vulnerable to cheap labor. Which jobs are hardest to outsource? Those that require a lot of knowledge.
So what does all this mean? It means that to the extent that we make "green" standards part of everything we design and manufacture, we create "green collar" jobs that are much more difficult to outsource. I.B.M. and other tech companies are discovering a mother lode of potential new business for their high-wage engineers and programmers thanks to the fact that mayors all over the world are thinking about going green through congestion pricing systems.How to say this: that is complete nonsense. It is false to assert that China is simply manufacturing products that, as Friedman suggests, are simply lower-end products made with cheap labor. In his impressive book, "The Chinese Century," Oded Shenkar writes:
China's goal, and that of its government is not merely to catch up with the major industrialized powers but to overpass them. No other developing country has sets its sights so high, and none...has laid such a detailed road map to take it there.
Shenkar's book lays out in great detail how China is already overtaking the rest of the world in the higher-end, high-value, highly-skilled product lines. Since Shenkar's book was published in 2004, Friedman could easily have access to Shenkar's data. But, there is a hitch--it contradicts Friedman's world view. .....(more)
The complete piece is at:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jonathan-tasini/does-tom-friedman-have-a-_b_56619.html