Growth took off in China. The Chinese started catching up very quickly with the United States.

Catching Up at Different Speeds

Some developing countries, especially in Africa, are late starters and their markets are relatively underdeveloped.

Coherent programs to promote economic catch up are relatively straightforward.

To begin, the national champions of the catch up phase must be rendered accessible to competitive assault.

Without relatively high savings, a developing country like China may never catch up.

If that happened, other countries Australia, New Zealand, and, most importantly, India might seek to jump on the bandwagon.

But the economics of innovation are very different for those at the frontier versus those who are followers striving to catch up.

First, although some parts of the economy reached advanced industrialization in record time, other parts (and institutions) are struggling to catch up.

It permits self confident political leaders to take charge of their own future. It allows them to shape the narrative that underpins market confidence, rather than play catch up.

This time, TFP growth soared to 5 6 , partly owing to the catching up process facilitated by China s adoption of foreign technology and know how.

Manufacturing enables rapid catch up because it is relatively easy to copy and implement foreign production technologies, even in poor countries that suffer from multiple disadvantages.

Leaders of OECD countries should look at Italy and recognize the dangers emerging from their young people who are being left behind.

Coherent programs to promote economic catch up are relatively straightforward. But the transition from follower to leader at the frontier of the innovation economy is more challenging and elusive.

Some conspiracy minded commentators even suggest that this is related to Europe s lack of competitiveness instead of trying to keep up, they say, Europe has decided to find a way to slow everyone else down.

But their ability to grow is being impaired because they lack the resources to confront the massive business lobbies of the EU s most developed and richest countries.

This opens up some room for governments to maneuver. It permits self confident political leaders to take charge of their own future. It allows them to shape the narrative that underpins market confidence, rather than play catch up.

Developing countries can thus sustain service led growth, given the huge room they have for catch up and convergence.

Russia can then forget about attaining the fast, sustainable growth that China has achieved.

HONG KONG For 250 years, technological innovation has driven economic development. But the economics of innovation are very different for those at the frontier versus those who are followers striving to catch up.

Political institutions needed to catch up.

Leaders of OECD countries should look at Italy and recognize the dangers emerging from their young people who are being left behind. In Italy itself, it is high time that older generations start acting with wisdom.

In 1964, it was the rapidly growing economies of Europe, still catching up to the US, that were howling about the Federal Reserve.

So long as Japan was playing catch up with the West, and government and industrial resources were concentrated on economic growth, the system worked quite well.

Many of them have rejoined their families.

In any meaningful international comparison, China s per capita stock of physical capital is still 8 10 times lower than in advanced countries like the United States and Japan. Without relatively high savings, a developing country like China may never catch up.

For catch up countries, like China, rapid growth is often accompanied by brisk structural change that moves factors of production, especially labor, from low productivity activities to economic sectors with much higher productivity.

If I would split China, look here, Shanghai has already catched up.

Young people, housewives and children. They are all running.

That is today s Europe in a nutshell, with America not far behind.

India s experience offers hope to other development late comers.

Its consequences are about to catch up with America, and the world.

Yet some other high income countries, such as the United States and Canada, are not keeping up.

Mind you, even the weak growth of the last few years in Latin America marks the region s best performance since the 1970 s, and incomes are actually catching up slowly to those in the US, Europe, and Japan. Nevertheless, Latin America remains the slowest growing of any of the world s developing regions.

Unless we learn how to respect it, we will all miss the boat.

The global economy will probably triple in size in the next quarter century, largely owing to growth in developing countries as they catch up to developed country incomes and adopt similar consumption patterns.

A democratic Russia would want to catch up with the West and integrate into Western institutions.

The gap between developed and developing countries continues to be impressive, although developing countries are slowly catching up.

In a conventional recession, the resumption of growth implies a reasonably brisk return to normalcy. The economy not only regains its lost ground, but, within a year, it typically catches up to its rising long run trend.

Earlier cases of successful economic catch up, such as the US or Germany, were no different.

The United States elected a black man president. And now we are in a phase in which Asia is catching up with the West and American hegemony is being challenged.

In 2002 a special effort was made to catch up', during which the police submitted more cases.

For catch up countries, like China, rapid growth is often accompanied by brisk structural change that moves factors of production, especially labor, from low productivity activities to economic sectors with much higher productivity. This adds to the surplus by increasing firms profitability.

If Germany provided this kind of leadership, other countries would be quick to follow.

Many Europeans doubt that Asia can catch up with Europe in terms of regional integration.