Early this year I found out that I have at least one thing
in common with Bill Gates; we both review books and blog about them. I discovered gatesnotes after reading a very amusing article in InsideHigherEd by Joshua Kim. The first sentence in Kim’s article caught my eye: “There is at
least one way that you and I can live our lives like a billionaire – we can
spend time reading and sharing our thoughts on books.”
Kim enumerates three things that Gates’ blog tells us about
wealth. I’ll just tell you the first and you can read Kim’s article for the
rest. “It takes Bill Gates as much time and effort to read and write about
books as it does for us. Being a billionaire does not mean that Bill Gates can
read faster or with more understanding than us, and it does not mean that his
thoughts on the books that he reads will be any more cogent or interesting.
When it comes to reading and writing about books, you and I are in the same
boat as Bill Gates. How many other activities in life can we say that
about? We can’t travel like Bill Gates.
Or live in a house like Bill Gates’s house. In many big ways life is different
for the rich. But not with books. This tells me that investing lots of time and
effort in reading and discussing lots of books is one way that we can live like
a billionaire.”
When I started this blog, I didn’t realize that I was going
to read more and blog about books. Looking back at the tags on my previous
posts, I see that a substantial number of them are my musings on books I’ve
read. In fact this happened within the first six months of blogging. If
anything my appetite of reading has increased. Thankfully I live right next to
a branch of my local city library. The system has a good collection and even if
the local branch does not have what I’m looking for, it’s easy to place a hold
on a book, and eventually it comes in. I have a list of books on hold.
After reading Kim’s article, I went to the Gates blog to
peruse what a billionaire reads. Turns out I have read a number of books he has
read, and I have even blogged about some of them. Some of his reviews are very
short and sparse, but others are more in-depth. While I had read a number of
the science-related books, I thought I should diversify my reading and look for
a genre I don’t normally read. After looking through a number of reviews, I
settled on How Asia Works by Joe Studwell – it has to with politics and economics, an area in which I am
particularly ignorant. I am however interested in Asia having lived there
before the boom times and subsequent Asian economic crisis. I put the book on
hold, and it arrived at the local library a couple of weeks ago. I’ve slowly
read through it over the past week, after finishing Matt Miodownik’s Stuff Matters. Bill Gates has reviewed
that too, but I found out about it from my wife who had listened to it on CD
over the course of weeks during her work commute.
Studwell concentrates on eight countries in east Asia and
groups them into two categories. The more successful northeast group consists
of Japan, China, South Korea, Taiwan. The less successful southeast group are
Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia and the Philippines. The story arc focuses on the
role of government in facilitating land policy in agriculture, then shifting to
industrial manufacturing, and finally to the role of the financial sector. Some
countries make the transitions better than others, and Studwell tries to draw
out the salient factors behind the successes and failures. There is plenty of
history in the accounts be it Meiji Japan, colonial approaches, post World War
II enforced restructuring, and Studwell seems to know quite a bit about the
many colorful characters involved.
The IMF and World Bank are generally portrayed as providing
less than ideal advice in fiscal policy and restructuring. Countries and
governments that adhered to the recommendations closely seem to have fared
worse in general, with South Korea being an exception. Comparisons are made
between the Asian countries, but also with reference to other industrialized
and industrializing countries around the world. The biggest factor that
Studwell harps on over and over is what he calls “export discipline”, i.e.,
that government in control through central banks strongly cajole (or in effect
force) entrepeneurs to be competitive on the world stage. Acquisition and
control of technology is an important factor. So is breaking the oligarchies
from moneyed historical families to force industrial development that can survive
and thrive on the world stage. There is a fine balance between conservative
control of finances and more liberal market procedures, the timing of which is
tricky.
It’s in a sense “easy” to look back and point out the
mistakes made – and there are many. Although you would think that one should
learn from history and not tread the same ruinous path. Humans are humans, and
don’t necessarily behave as the economists’ rational actor. Countries that
started out in similar “economic conditions” at least measured by Gross
National Income and similar wealth differentials measured by the Gini
coefficient start to diverge as they take different paths. Studwell’s narrative
features a number of “strongmen” who have driven different economic policies
for good and ill. It’s a sobering story, and from a recent visit to Asia, I can
see the after-effects of financial policies that resulted in skyrocketing real-estate
and speculative trading.
My next book (just picked up from the library) isn’t on the
Gates blog. It is related to Asia though, but brings in history and science/technology.
I’m looking forward to Simon Winchester’s The
Man Who Loved China, covering the story of Joseph Needham and his “discovery”
of how the early innovations of China.
No comments:
Post a Comment