Some day, Mao will be recognized as the greatest developmental economist ever. Perhaps recognition will dawn when someone edits his opinions and compares them to his results.
Starting with an illiterate, typhus-infected population living in rubble, and working entirely under massive Western sanctions and embargoes, Mao provided basic universal health care and doubled life expectancy from 35 to 68. No country matches the pace of life expectancy increase under Mao, nor its increase in prosperity.
Germany's fastest development growth was 33% per decade from 1880-1914.
Japan's was 43% from 1874-1929
USSR's was 54% between 1928-58.
Mao's decadal growth rate was 64% between 1952-72. [Mao Zedong: A Political and Intellectual Portrait 1st Edition. Maurice Meisner].
After 30+ years in development I find the idea that Duflo/Banerjee are the heirs of Hirschman bizarre. RCTs are by their nature short term. In the early years of the RCT bandwagon I reviewed a large number. Typically the Principal Investigator only left his Harvard desk for one month a year. He, or she, did not do any tramping through fields collecting data. National subcontractors did that. Dependent on ever more convoluted statistical techniques, RCTs are just another form of the mathiness which Hirschman tried to avoid.
I am no economist, let alone a developmental economist, but I love reading Hirschman. His "The Passions and the Interests" with Amartya Sen's illuminating introduction was a real revelation about how the case for Capitalism was made before it became the Deathstar. Also made me me think of how 'interest' is such an interesting category - part cognitive, part affective, part social.
Sincere thanks for nepotistic factory managers.
Some day, Mao will be recognized as the greatest developmental economist ever. Perhaps recognition will dawn when someone edits his opinions and compares them to his results.
Starting with an illiterate, typhus-infected population living in rubble, and working entirely under massive Western sanctions and embargoes, Mao provided basic universal health care and doubled life expectancy from 35 to 68. No country matches the pace of life expectancy increase under Mao, nor its increase in prosperity.
Germany's fastest development growth was 33% per decade from 1880-1914.
Japan's was 43% from 1874-1929
USSR's was 54% between 1928-58.
Mao's decadal growth rate was 64% between 1952-72. [Mao Zedong: A Political and Intellectual Portrait 1st Edition. Maurice Meisner].
After 30+ years in development I find the idea that Duflo/Banerjee are the heirs of Hirschman bizarre. RCTs are by their nature short term. In the early years of the RCT bandwagon I reviewed a large number. Typically the Principal Investigator only left his Harvard desk for one month a year. He, or she, did not do any tramping through fields collecting data. National subcontractors did that. Dependent on ever more convoluted statistical techniques, RCTs are just another form of the mathiness which Hirschman tried to avoid.
🤣🤣🤣this is true.
I am no economist, let alone a developmental economist, but I love reading Hirschman. His "The Passions and the Interests" with Amartya Sen's illuminating introduction was a real revelation about how the case for Capitalism was made before it became the Deathstar. Also made me me think of how 'interest' is such an interesting category - part cognitive, part affective, part social.