> uvj at vsnl.com wrote:
>
>>55% of Chinese exports are done by the foreign funded enterprises. Why the
>>US and the EU don't encourage the development of manufacturing industry in
>>Central and South America in a similar fashion? Higher wage costs relative
>>to China?
>
> That, yes, but for low-wage workers, Chinese are extremely skilled.
> Nothing like Communism to deliver a first-rate labor force to capital!
It's not just Communism. There's a Catch-22 when it comes to education and economic development. An MNC won't invest in sophisticated industries in Guatemala, in part because of a lack of well-trained industrial engineers. But it wouldn't make any sense for Guatemala to invest in engineering schools when it doesn't have any industries for its graduates to take jobs in. (It would only result in brain-drain and unemployment.) One reason China and Russia have a lot of well-trained industrial workers is because under Communism they developed indiginous industries - *along* with the skilled workers to man them.
Seth