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The higher education system in these countries (US, Korea etc) has become like a theatre in which some people decided to stand to get a better view, promoting the others behind them to stand. Once enough people stand, everyone has to stand, which means no one is getting a better view, while everyone has become more uncomfortable.

Ha-Joon Chang

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Ha-Joon Chang
Age: 61
Born: 1963
Born: October 7
Economist
Seoul Teukbyeolsi
Enough
Education
Decided
Mean
Getting
View
Promoting
Like
Everyone
Behinds
Korea
People
Means
Behind
Etc
Others
Higher
Uncomfortable
Become
Views
Theatre
Better
Stand
Economics
Country
System
Countries

More quotes by Ha-Joon Chang

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95% of Economics is common sense deliberately made complicated.
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The days are over when technology can be advanced in laboratories by individual scientists alone. Now you need an army of lawyers to negotiate the hazardous terrain of interlocking patents. Unless we find a solution to the problem of interlocking patents, the patent system may actually impede the very innovation it was designed to encourage.
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Democracy is acceptable to neo-liberals only in so far as it does not contradict the free market.
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Self-interest, to be sure, is one of the most important, but we have many other motives - honesty, self-respect, altruism, love, sympathy, faith, sense of duty, solidarity, loyalty, public-spiritedness, patriotism, and so on - that are sometimes even more important than self-seeking as the driver of our behaviors.
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People 'over-produce' pollution because they are not paying for the costs of dealing with it.
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The best way to boost the economy is to redistribute wealth downward, as poorer people tend to spend a higher proportion of their income.
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The foundation of economic development is the acquisition of more productive knowledge.
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People who live in poor countries have to be entrepreneurial even just to survive.
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Low inflation and government prudence may be harmful for economic development.
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Democracy and markets are both fundamental building blocks for a decent society. But they clash at a fundamental level. We need to balance them.
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We are not smart enough to leave things to the market.
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Equality of opportunity is meaningless for those who do not have the capabilities to take advantage of it.
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A well-designed welfare state can actually encourage people to take chances with their jobs and be more, not less, open to changes.
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History is on the side of the regulators.
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The Korean economic miracle was the result of a clever and pragmatic mixture of market incentives and state direction.
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Countries are poor not because their people are lazy their people are 'lazy' because they are poor.
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There is a big logical jump between acknowledging the destructive nature of hyperinflation and arguing that the lower the rate of inflation, the better.
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