Foreign Perspective

US economists praise China's economic achievements in 60 yrs

(Xinhua)
Updated: 2009-09-01 13:43

Some US economists gave positive comments after reviewing China's economic achievements over the past 60 years since the establishment of the People's Republic of China.

In the 60 years, China generally has done quite well, Kenneth J. DeWoskin, a senior consultant in Strategy and Business Development for Pricewaterhouse Coopers LLP, told Xinhua in a written interview recently.

He is a co-founder of the Wharton International Forum in Shanghai, and is a fluent speaker of Mandarin.

DeWoskin's experience with Chinese mainland went back to 1977, when he first traveled there.

"In that brief time of two generations, the degree of life-style change is hard to grasp. No one from outside China who has not been there in the last few years could fully grasp it," he said.

"Development at the pace of China's last 60 years must also create some imbalances, and imbalances reach a point where they trigger adjustments. But comparing today, in the midst of the worst global financial crisis in three generations, to 1949, it is obvious that even major adjustments have gotten more and more orderly, more and more manageable as reforms progress," said DeWoskin.

"China's economic growth since the 1980s has created great wealth for the country and for much of the urban population. Adjustments are being accelerated through stimulus spending to increase income and consumption in rural China," he said.

"The current growth model is rooted deeply in two things: in the economic reforms since 1949 followed by the reforms since the late 1970s, combined with deep enduring traits of a Chinese 'economic culture.' The role of private capital and markets constitutes the reforms; individual and shared senses of economic well-being constitute the culture," he added.

Lawrence R Klein, Nobel laureate in Economics in 1980, is one of the most outstanding Econometrics researchers of the 20th century. After his first trip to China in 1979, he has been involved in research on China for 30 years.

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Now the Chinese economy is self-sustaining, but at the beginning of its opening-up and reforms, which started in 1978, the country had to rely on foreign teaching and input, said Klein.

The hallmark of the reforms in this period is adherence to gradualism.

The Chinese economy has far exceeded expectations since 1978. The country generally has overcome food shortage, and is now delivering middle class living conditions to many citizens, the economist said.

There are new features that are accompanying these economic achievements of China, Klein said. In the process of economic transition, the income distribution is becoming more unequal, he said.

There is also regional inequality, but the move towards westward economic development away from the shoreline may help to improve the regional distribution, he pointed out.