. "9 What Might Life in the United States Be Like if It Is Not Competitive in Science and Technology?." Rising Above the Gathering Storm: Energizing and Employing America for a Brighter Economic Future. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press, 2007.
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Rising Above the Gathering Storm: Energizing and Employing America for a Brighter Economic Future
FIGURE 9-1 Projected growth of emerging markets for selected countries, in billions of constant 2003 US dollars, 2000-2050.
SOURCE: Goldman Sachs. Dreaming with the BRICs: The Path to 2050. Global Economics. Paper No. 99. New York: Goldman Sachs, October 2003.
China alone could have 595 million middle-income consumers and 82 million upper-middle-income consumers,10 a combined number that is double the total projected population of the United States in that period. China’s domestic market is already the largest in the world for more than 100 products. With 300 million subscribers and rising, China already is by far the biggest mobile-telephone market in the world. Only a small fraction of its population has Internet access, but China still has 100 million computer users, second only to the United States. China has become the second largest market for personal computers, and it will soon pass the United States.11 Many US companies—including Google, Yahoo, eBay, and Cisco—expect China to be their largest market in the next 20 years.12
For decades, the United States has been the world’s largest and most sophisticated market for an enormous range of goods and services. US consumers have stimulated productivity around the world with our apparently insatiable demand. Foreign multinational companies have invested in the
10
P. A. Laudicina. World Out of Balance: Navigating Global Risks to Seize CompetitiveAdvantage. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2005. P. 76.
11
C. Prestowitz. Three Billion New Capitalists: The Great Shift of Wealth and Power to theEast. New York: Basic Books, 2005. P. 74.
12
D. Gillmor. Now Is Time to Face Facts, Make Needed Investment. San Jose Mercury News, March 14, 2004.
