We basically agree then: as China takes up higher value activities, they won't need those activities from the US anymore. Also, France is the cutting edge designer of nuclear power plants these days.
> Why did the software revolution happen in the same place we were building the microchips?
Hardware people becoming software people was extremely common back then, and still is today (EEs can make more coding than using their degree directly). Now we have the opposite problem (we don't have enough hardware people because software sucked all the oxygen out of the room) and China has less of it (although increasingly...they are repeating history as well). If anything, this just backs up my point in how higher value activities de-emphasize manufacturing (even super high end manufacturing as in semiconductors).
You can replace perceived value with actual value if you don't agree with the value judgement calls that were made, which is entirely reasonable.
"we don't have enough hardware people because software sucked all the oxygen out of the room"
How much is this exacerbated by the lack of domestic hardware manufacturing in the US for the hardware people? Seems like software boom starting in the late 1990's happened as China came online for hardware outsourcing. Not suggesting a causal relationship there, just complementary effects.
The same thing happens in China. If you want a good job, software will pay way more than hardware. Heck, you even see people from Taiwan doing software jobs in China because they at more than the hardware jobs in Taiwan that they could get.
> Why did the software revolution happen in the same place we were building the microchips?
Hardware people becoming software people was extremely common back then, and still is today (EEs can make more coding than using their degree directly). Now we have the opposite problem (we don't have enough hardware people because software sucked all the oxygen out of the room) and China has less of it (although increasingly...they are repeating history as well). If anything, this just backs up my point in how higher value activities de-emphasize manufacturing (even super high end manufacturing as in semiconductors).
You can replace perceived value with actual value if you don't agree with the value judgement calls that were made, which is entirely reasonable.