The view from China: things are good.(Letter to the editor)

Business is dismal in the United States, but not in China. Yes, there are 20,000 factories suffering or closing in Southeast China--firms that supply American and Western consumers--but the Northeast part of the country is still moving ahead.

China pumps out 535,000 new engineers a year. Obama is trying to get the U.S. to put out 53,000 or so. I watched a documentary about the U.S. school system and how it is a battle just to keep the students in school. There was one school that had only one person passing algebra out of its entire class. Chinese kids love school and they study to 11 p.m. to get into college.

It seems like the whole U.S. system is having a cultural breakdown, and so I do not know where it will be 10 years from now as measured against China.

The Chinese government just announced the introduction of 135 new high-speed trains. I have been on many. They are as quiet as a church mouse. With 15 carriages, they move 1,500 people at a time. America has to put seven jets into the air to get the same amount of people moved. I go from Shenyang to Beijing in four hours and I stand in the coffee shop onboard sipping cappuccino while this thing blasts along at 200 miles per hour. Now, they want to upgrade it so it goes 280 miles per hour. And when that train rolls into the station like a long bullet snake, we have exactly two minutes to board before the electric doors shut. It is a precision marvel.

Also, this year they are building 1,700 miles of first-class interstate roads, beautifully built. They are installing 20 million tons of gas and oil pipeline from Shenzhen in the South to Urumuqi in the Northeast. In Shenyang where I live--the same town where the new Cessna sports aircraft is built--a local company just built the 1,000th door for the Airbus aircraft. There is nothing chitzy about that type of manufacturing.

There is no catching this country now. It is not in debt. The people are not up to their eyeballs in credit card debt or foreclosure meltdowns. They buy everything with cash and save like crazy. They have an addiction to training and study. They are building a blue water navy.

I think the good 'ol US of A needs more than a financial crisis. They need a massive wake up call bigger than they have ever experienced.

I love the United States and my own country of Australia, but China has reached critical mass and will be the global leader. The U.S. must do a massive shake up in technology and major attitude shifts of the young people--and I do not know how that can be done.

--Neill Newton

China Fortune Investment Group

neillnewton@gmail.com

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