What if Moore's law wasn't really an exponential, but more of a step function over the past 50 years. What if it was a one-time fluke that greatly advanced society, but we're gearing up for a long haul of flat or linear growth?
It explains a lot, including why China is able to quickly catch up to the U.S. in tech. If U.S. tech was really growing exponentially, it would be impossible for China to gain ground even if it was growing at an equal exponential rate. It also explains why iPhone sales are down. It isn't because of lower consumer demand or market saturation, those are just symptoms of a larger problem. It's because the rate of innovation is slowing down.
We've relied on Moore's law of exponential growth for three generations, but it's sadly dying (if not dead). The ramifications will affect everything.
I think the smartphone industry’s slower growth is more the result of diminishing returns from the form factor than the cessation of Moore’s law.
Not so for exponential growth. e^x will always be greater than e^(x-t).
In any case, a simple exponential equation is too simplistic for real economies.
“One is that as Chinese technology converges on that of advanced countries, the room for rapid improvement through borrowing declines”
Also while Moore's "the number of transistors in a dense integrated circuit doubles about every two years" may be ending, the more significant rising number of cycles per second per dollar will probably continue one way or another.
I daresay the effect of tech money wise will do a step function if we hit super human AI. Rather than saying to a builder can you work on my house and him saying maybe Tuesday week I can do something, which doesn't change much if he has an iphone of not we'll be able to say robot, build me another 1000 robots and then a huge palace. Maybe.
Its R&D spending as a percentage of GDP is already head & shoulders above most other developing economies and in fact above several Western European economies (it is close to the level of France) but still below Japan and South Korea, for example.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_researc...
Just getting them up to current Chinese standards will ensure China’s economy for awhile.
Um.... No. There are now less than 600M people living in poverty around the world. There are now less 30M of Chinese living in poverty. With the aim of getting close eradicating poverty by 2020.
You're thinking about the poverty line of $1.90 a day, what the late Hans Rosling would refer to as Level 1. And you're spot on.
Relatively speaking though anyone living on level 4 feels like level 2 or 3 is 'poverty' in comparison. From that perspective there is still a lot of potential upside and maybe that's what the parent was trying to say?
If these are the primary factors, then the closest analogues to China would be other East Asian economies like Japan and South Korea. These nations greatly value education, with top-tiered performance in international tests, and invest heavily in R&D.
An oft-repeated criticism that authoritarianism constrains scientific and technological creativity is still unproven and will be tested in the coming decades by China. [2]
[1] From Wikipedia: “Endogenous growth theory holds that economic growth is primarily the result of endogenous and not external forces.[1] Endogenous growth theory holds that investment in human capital, innovation, and knowledge are significant contributors to economic growth.”
https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/economic-sciences/2018/pre... https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Endogenous_growth_theory
[2] How China could dominate science. https://www.economist.com/leaders/2019/01/12/how-china-could...