Growth dynamics change fast, but nothing suggests sharp slowdown inevitable

Economic growth in China is likely to decline even "more than general experience would suggest", despite it being the only country in history to have such sustained economic development in the last three decades, said a new research paper conducted by Harvard economists Lawrence Summers and Lant Pritchett.

There is nothing in the analysis that suggests "a sharp slowdown is inevitable" in China, Summers and Pritchett said, adding that forecasters should widen the range of expected outcomes with regard to the second-largest economy in the world.

Consensus forecasts for the global economy over the medium and long-term predict the world's economic gravity will substantially shift toward Asia and especially toward China and India, they said. "While such forecasts may pan out, there are substantial reasons that China and India may grow much less rapidly than is currently anticipated. Most importantly, history teaches that abnormally rapid growth is rarely persistent, even though economic forecasts invariably extrapolate recent growth."