Interesting. I had the impression that Chinese will likely become very useful during our lifetimes... With the momentum their economy has, I expect knowledge of both English and Chinese to become a very sought out skill
Four decades later: I guess some fraction of the optimists have emigrated; the pessimists might be finding their language skills freshly in demand; and the realists teach their grandchildren: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fE3UUbBKDS8
Hah, that joke is more widespread than I realised. The Czech version is that optimists learn English, pessimists learn Russian, and realists learn marksmanship.
- hundreds of thousands run away after the Ukraine invasion to not get drafted (learning English was probably very useful for that, lingua franca of business and generally of the world)
-China is looking to make Russia their puppet state / due to embargo Russians cannot buy stuff from the West, so they try to get stuff via China (on a side note, they also get embargoed there to some degree + this comes at a cost)
-the poor are conscripted to die charging with their Kalashnikov against artillery. What's the expected life of them? 1 day?
We seem to be moving away from that future (or perhaps it was never really true to begin with).
In the 80's, it was Japanese because they were going to take over the world.
In the 90's, I was told to take Spanish in college because the US was going to be a bilingual country.
As an adult in the 2000's, I watch US helicopter parents scramble to put their kids into immersive Mandarin courses, mimicking the Japanese fad of the 80's.
I'm at least proficient in four languages, none of which are the above four, and my life and career has been just dandy.
TBH, automated translation is the only potential I see to reduce the massive need for Chinese language skills in the future. Already we (in the US) get (and choose to use!!) parts whose data sheets are only available in Chinese. It seems clear to me where we are going.
What in the supply chain fuck up is that? How do you even get quotes? I've been supply chain at Tesla, Amazon Excelsior metals and i've never, ever had someone send me a data sheet only in chinese.
>It’s very hard to see how those local barriers to entry would reverse the global trend.
Close to 20% of all Chinese exports are easily priced out with a 60% tarrif. Again, you don't need to "Reverse a global trend", you only need to reverse the local barriers to distance trade between the two nations.
So yes, learn that mandarin. Might help you land a job as a project manager for the belt and road initiative in Ghana!