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689 points taubek | 1 comments | | HN request time: 0s | source
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rayiner ◴[] No.43632822[source]
Americans need to get over their view of “Asia” as being about making shoes. When I was working in engineering in the early aughts, we mocked the Chinese as being able only to copy American technology. Today, China is competitive with or ahead of America in key technology areas, including nuclear power, AI, EVs, and batteries.

We need to anticipate a future where China is equal to America on a per capita basis, but four times bigger. Is that a world where “Designed by Apple in California, Made in China” still makes sense? What will be America’s competitive edge in that scenario?

What seems most likely to me in the future is that the US will find itself in the same position the UK is in now. Dominating finance and services won’t mean anything when both the IP and the physical products are being produced somewhere else.

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1. 627467 ◴[] No.43638810[source]
> we mocked the Chinese as being able only to copy American technology

As you state they haven't been "only" copying for a while and my problem with people keep repeating this "logic" (mea culpa) is precisely what's at stake right now: designing and "creating" is critical, but I'd argue that civilization is not made my design or one-off (or limited) editions. Civilization is the ability to innovate in mass production, in doing so, consistently in lower and lower costs. China excels (and will continue to excel) while they continue to appreciate this. The "service sector" world stopped caring about this.