Hacker News Reader

> what China demonstrated here is, that it is totally possible for a poor country to bootstrap itself

All the American and European companies who moved production there bootstrapped China. The money had to come from somewhere. China saw the immense opportunity in western greed and ran with it.

View on HN

USSR (for all its faults) achieved the same thing in a more hostile environment than the PRC.

The USSR achieved more than just the same thing. When you say more hostile environment, I'm assuming you mean they were in an essentially autarkic condition, unlike contemporary China. But beyond that, the Soviets produced far greater, actually novel results in sciences, mathematics, and technology while having only one-fifth of China's population.

If anything, the Chinese education system is a ripoff from Soviet Union, not the Western countries. It is probably still is.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com