A Chinese Education, for a Price
nytimes.com
nytimes.com
My aunt had surgery about a year ago, and our family paid out quite a bit of money to everyone involved in her surgery. On top of the normal fees, we gave the surgeon, first assist, second assist, anesthesiologist, and even the secretary large sums of money.
When my mother told me about this, I was shocked. "Why?" I asked. You'll have to understand that my family in China, while well off, has never participated in the cycles of alleged corruption. In fact, my uncle rejects so many bribes (gifts from business interactions) to the point that people have started leaving gifts anonymously at my grandmother's door.
Yet, this wasn't about getting ahead in life. My mother told me, "we just want to make sure they have an incentive to do the best job they can." Honestly, I don't blame her. We didn't pay to skip a line, and we didn't pay for any organs (not that type of surgery anyway). We paid the people involved because we felt it would inspire them to do a better job.
Is that wrong? Maybe. I don't really know anymore.
To clarify for our non-American readers: In the USA, and possibly Canada as well, waitstaff in restaurants are typically not paid a living wage (that is, they're paid even less than minimum wage, which isn't a living wage by itself anymore either) because both restaurants and the law expect them to make it up in tips. In some restaurants, the menu will say that an automatic gratuity (that is, a tip) of some specified percentage is added to the bill of parties of eight or more people. Typically, tips range from 15%-20% of the total bill, but there's no law governing how much people actually give.
Merely bringing this up in the wrong crowd will reliably generate a massive argument. So, uh, keep that in mind, too.
The stringency and fairness of the university entrance system in Taiwan seemed to drive a lot of quality in curriculum standards and instruction in secondary schooling in Taiwan. (In those days, compulsory, taxpayer-subsidized schooling for all was provided through ninth grade. Many students went on to three grades of senior high after taking entrance exams for senior high schools. The best and most desired senior high schools were free to attend, having taxpayer subsidies, but of course were hard to get into.)
In most countries, over time, democratization leads to ever-greater provision of higher education places, with ever-greater public subsidies. Today, the best universities in Taiwan still enroll very well prepared students, who take many of the core subjects using the same English-language textbooks used at the better univerisities in the States. Some of the lesser universities in Taiwan are barely above the level of typical colleges in the United States, but in general there is still good quality of secondary education there. Selection to higher levels of schooling that is based on achievement at earlier levels of schooling, rather than based on bribes or connections, makes a whole country better off.
The result of the examination system (which, FWIW, is not unique to Taiwan) is that high school kids routinely spend 12+ hours each day schooling. When they're not at public school, they're at private cram schools, and success in the exams certainly haven't been democratized for those who cannot afford the extra, private help to get ahead.
So sure, it isn't corrupt, but the integrity of the examination system doesn't mean egalitarianism, not by a long shot.
A fair competition however is.
The best will rise up - working 12 hours a day if needed. How is that a bad thing?
The Sui dynasty you referred to was an exception, but the next one Tang (618-907), succumbed to military (whose positions were inherited)'s influence on the civil government (by civil government I also mean the part of the government that is selected by meritocracy).
The Ming dynasty (1368–1644), succumbed to overt influence on the civil government by corrupt eunuchs (who were forbidden from learning to write/going into politics, and therefore did not achieve their status through examinations). "any senior official who wanted to discuss state matters had to persuade powerful eunuchs with a bribe simply to have his demands or message relayed to the emperor." (wikipedia)
The Qing again here is an "exception". It's decline was due to its "Banner Army" soldiers being ineffective; They were the elite fighting force of China at the time, but during times of peace, the soldiers escaped training for their own profit; This decline was (IMO) due to recruiting soldiers not because people would be good soldiers, but because they were biologically related. The armies weren't even effective at putting down internal rebellions (requiring the assistance of european troops, the same factions that have bullied china into unequal treaties - how humiliating.)
All these dynasties have fallen either because the influence of the meritocracy part of the government (civil or military) was greatly reduced; This was also correlated with increased levels of corruption (I don't know which caused what).
I can see similarities between historical dynasties and the present day PRC government. They first rebelled and eliminated corruption in the KMT government, and have now succumbed to corruption itself.
1) Passing old Chinese tests required literacy, something we want bureaucrats to have. This is a big chunk of what liberal arts degrees are about. (Calligraphy, too, was included in the test.)
2) Studying Confucianism meant that you at least had to think and respond about moral and ethical matters. Again, I'd rather have a bureaucrat who has thought about morality and ethics than one who hasn't. And according to Wikipedia,
> The core of Confucianism is humanism, the belief that human beings are teachable, improvable and perfectible through personal and communal endeavour especially including self-cultivation and self-creation.
3) People with liberal arts degrees quite often take posts that are entirely unrelated to their field of study.
Saying that "Confucianists got jobs which they didn't deserve" is just a pathetic jab at Chinese culture.
1. Convention and desire for free and equal access to basic education is one of the cornerstones of the meritocracy, which prevents a purely economic solution. Even at the university level the government gives lenders extra recourse and the schools themselves provide aid.
2. Credentialism: access to well known schools is highly prized and self perpetuating. Even if a new school has an excellent staff it could take decades for graduates to go out in the world and make the school's reputation.
3. Access to peers: beyond pure credentialism and instructor quality is the caliber of the fellow students that can make a big difference.
4. GPA inflation. The students constantly try to exert pressure on the instructor to raise GPA. If the instructor gives in what happens is effectively GPA socialism ... if many students have a high GPA the true top students are no longer easily distinguished by GPA. Admissions officers then track the students' performance and incoming GPA versus their originating school ... a high GPA from that school is then worth less.
This already happens.
Waterloo University in Canada, recognized as one of the worlds top CS and Engineering Universities, has admitted tracking grades from each incoming high school and then comparing them to what each student gets at University.
My admissions person admitted this to me in 2000.
It's been going on for a while:)
I've read that this dates back to the Chinese civil service exam system which is ancient by Western standards and has a long tradition of people coming up with clever ways to cheat.
It's a vicious circle because it's valuable preparation for a society that often demands cheating (ie. if you don't cheat, you can't get anything) but it also produces people whose MO is "get anything you can by cheating, and just don't get caught". Like a society wholly made up of investment bankers :)
Over the years, many Private non church based schools got started with better standards (Since there was money to be made). Most of the schools that were doing well in my generation are now closed or on their death bed.
Its purely supply and demand. If schools can demand huge donations, it matter of time before more & better schools get started increasing the supply.
India is a generation ahead of China in Corruption (Sad but true).
In my libertarian opinion, the competition start when the participants can make an informed choice - ie when they have a basic education.
Basic education, teaching everyone to read and count, provides positive externalities too- so it's generally regarded as a good thing, and many government provide public basic education. (some push that even further, but let's not talk about that yet)
An alternative is having companies providing basic education, and students enrolling with vouchers - ie opening competition on the education service market while fixing demand, to keep the positive externality. It is even better than the former option.
But biasing the competition even before it is started, by having a single government-run education scheme, where bribery and cronyism replace healthy competition is so wrong!
Is that a collectivist troll?
In that event, let me warm your heart: your reasoning hold perfectly well if you replace education by healthcare.
It's simply a fact that children, left to their own devices, teach themselves to read and to count.
Why? Because whatever one is interested in, such knowledge is a gateway to learning more (and sharing). And learning is fun...
How would one go about teaching one's self to read?
The general case is: pursuing something cool for its own sake is enhanced by learning language and other gateway knowledge i.e. knowledge which aids wider learning. No teaching or curriculum or testing or extrinsic motivation is required. Help is available. I'm not advocating neglect.
And there are the additional benefits of saving vast amounts of time and not damaging creativity.
Their government now seems to have taken the worst parts of capitalism, and mixed it with the worst parts of socialism.
And thats just up to high-school; it's very clear that money can get you into any university, merits or not.
I had no advantages of highly educated parents nor much money, yet I was able to get through high school and into a good state university, then a decent phd program; money was paid but not that much, and definitely nothing to the public per-university schools I went to.
Yes, the US is better than China, but when you realize the US is much closer to China than say.. Canada, it is a bit disheartening.
Yes, you did succeed with little to start with: congratulations. I could find people with your story in China as well. The sad truth though is that most people in your situation did not do as well as you; what happened to all of your high school classmates?
GP may be exaggerating a bit, but there is an incredibly high correlation to parental wealth and success in the US. For high school, if you don't go to a nice expensive private school, it'll really help to live in a (expensive) neighborhood with great public schools.
I attended a public university, but it was very clear that the kids there disproportionately had high parental income. And.. the kids with the high parental income tended to a) get higher grades and B) get better jobs afterward.
But whatever problems we have in the states, the problems in china are very different and much more wicked.
As for admission to some Ivy League Universities, there have been allegations where donations have to be made.
Call it corruption, capitalism or communism, still looks like money has to be paid to someone. Official or unofficial the rates are high.
This happens on the other side of the fence too, the Chinese media also covers disproportionately the failures of the US.
The only takeaway here is to not get all of your information from one place - even if it is the New York Times.
The system sucks and kudos to NYT for informing us, even if it has landed them on the wrong side of the great firewall. Ya, bad things happen in the states too but the NYT has no problem reporting on that! The western and Chinese press are just completely incomparable when it comes to bias. Wen is also right, this corruption will tear china apart if it doesn't end soon.
That being said, china can be a nice place to live if you are a foreigner, have lots of moment to send your kids to international school, or are a local with lots of guanxi, or you don't have kids yet. You'll hardly realize corruption in your daily life outside of some key but rare activities (like buying property or dealing with local schools).
My post is in response to the notion that, given all the reporting you see in Western media re: China, the whole country looks like one gigantic shithole.
This perception is not entirely surprising. Even when one gets all of their news from the NYT (which as far as as bias and truthfulness goes, is pretty damn good), there is a systemic bias in getting Eastern news from Western sources by mere virtue of the fact that you'll never hear the good with the bad - you'll just hear the bad.
This isn't some evil conspiracy to slag China - it is this way for the same reason the 6 o'clock news is full of murders and robberies. Except, unlike the 6 o'clock news, you don't have real-life experience to temper the one-sidedness.
If you get all of your world view from local news sources, you'll have a very skewed world view, even if all of the content you consume is factual.
China's family-power politics is very entrenched by now, no one is really immune to it: if you try to be clean, you'll get kicked out because that would make you immune to the nuclear option (don't tell on me, and I won't tell on you). The government will give the public some bones whenever some official makes a serious mistake that can't be covered up, or otherwise someone who has more guanxi than the target has some score to settle.
The United States GNI at PPP (gross national income at purchasing power parity) is $48,890 whereas Mexico's is $15,120 and China's is $8,430. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GNI_(PPP)_...
So if corruption is related to relative GNI at PPP (obviously that isn't the only factor, but I think it is likely to be a significant one) then we can expect problems related to corruption to be about 3 times as bad in Mexico as they are in the US. Similarly we would expect China's problems to be about 6 times as bad.