标题: Why China Overtakes the U.S. 中国为什么会超越美国？ [打印本页] 作者: Interpreter 时间: 2020-9-8 09:54 标题: Why China Overtakes the U.S. 中国为什么会超越美国？ 回帖下载完整视频、音频及双语全文：
I first came to China to study Mandarin at Nankai University in the mid-1990s. At that time, if I wanted to visit the Forbidden City or eat Peking Duck in Quanjude, it would take three hours to get to Beijing by train from Tianjin. But today? It only takes 30 minutes by high-speed rail.
For the 23 years I've lived here, China has focused on infrastructure and innovation. One big driver is investment in high-speed rail – China has already built 35,000 kilometers of high-speed rail, connecting 100 cities. There are more than 100 cities in China with a population of over one million. China has just announced that it plans to increase the total railway mileage by a third in the next 15 years, from 140,000 km to 200,000 total km.
Now, let’s compare infrastructure spending between China and Japan. Japan has also invested heavily in high-speed rail to offset the economic stagnation of the 1980s after the Plaza Accord. However, many of these trains connected big cities such as Tokyo to tiny villages with only 2,000 people, and thus were wasted as white elephant spending as very few passengers took the trains.
By contrast, China has focused on connecting major cities to improve economic efficiency. By 2035, China's declared aim is that all cities with a population of greater than 500,000 will be connected to high-speed rail. This allows white-collar workers to move away from the expensive city centers and find cheaper housing. People now live in cities like Tianjin, where housing prices are lower, and where it is easier to get a Hukou and commute to Beijing. This was unheard of when I was studying at Nankai University.
Having this world-class infrastructure is why China will not lose its manufacturing dominance in the near future despite the U.S.-China trade war.
拥有这种世界级的基础设施，使中国即使在美中贸易战中也不会失去制造业主导地位。
In the United States, trains run on a much slower system. The average speed of most trains is only 128 km/h, compared that, with 350 km/h for China's high-speed trains.
Since I was born in 1977, the United States has spent too much money on wars and building weapons rather than infrastructure spending. It would be great if the United States could learn from China and focus on infrastructure innovation instead of focusing spending efforts on wars. Just imagine how better off my fellow Americans would be with a focus not on conflict but instead on connection.