The game show is highly ritualized and contestants prepare for it. A very small group of highly motivated contestants compete. If you were to take an untutored chess player to a tournament, they would feel the same way.
If you spend some time on the big future site, you will see that the majority of inventions that will change the world come from the US. If you did more deeply into the background of the inventors you will see they pursued their ideas for their own sake.
http://nextbigfuture.com/China will need one or two more generations to undo the cultural aversion to the study of ideas for their own sake. It is deeply ingrained into the culture from thousands of years of despotism. The history of ideas in the West as compared to China is an interesting field of study. Logic was never invented by the Chinese and it has crippled the intellctual disciplines as a result. If you look at all that rests on Logic in the West, there is a huge gap.
A lot of manufacturing is coming back to the US from China. This is just one story.
http://www.plasticstoday.com/articles/farouk-systems-inc-brings-manufacturing-us"As it turns out, Farouk Systems� move to the U.S. isn�t an isolated case. Many companies are bringing manufacturing back to North America, primarily because the bulk of their customer base in here. Cost increases in materials and transportation, counterfeiting problems, and logistics problems in the supply chain have caused many manufacturers to relocate production either to the U.S., Canada, or Mexico.
A 2009 study by Archstone Consulting LLC, cites 10 �macro forces� that are currently undermining the offshoring trend, with nearly 90% of manufacturers reporting that they are considering or have already begun rebalancing their manufacturing and supply strategy due to cost increases in offshoring: 40% have reported an increase in aggregate cost of 25% or more; 90% expect further increases of 10% or more, said Archstone�s study."
I work with JVs' principals that do or have done business with PRC firms and the quality of the work has declined over time and they have switched to a new vendors not based in the PRC, some of which are here. I have seen business stolen by PRC firms who reverse engineered designs, but when the systems failed while in the field, the end users switched back to US products.
The CPC thinks it can steal the economic success of the West without all the other things that come with it. This is creating a huge level of stress in both the US and the PRC as the US uses China as a piggy bank to finance consumption and China sees it as a way to build an economy. It is very unhealthy and cannot continue for much longer.
