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Journalism of Courage
The world may have spent the past two years buffeted by economic storms, but some countries have sailed through unscathed and even thrived. South East Asia, Japan, mainland Europe and Latin America all got stuck in the quagmire. But the United States economy has defied all predictions by carrying on growing at spectacular rates.
Australia, too, has defied the doomsayers who predicted that the Asian crisis would knock it into recession. While the Indonesian economy shrank by 14 per cent last year, Australia8217;s grew by 5 per cent. Singapore, too, came through remarkably unscathed. The Irish Republic remains a miracle economy, putting in growth rates of more than 8 per cent for five years in a row. Canada has grown steadily, and even Britain, despite the occasional wobble, is in the best economic shape it has been in for decades, with unemployment half the level seen across the Channel.
After extensive research 8212; talking it over with a couple of colleagues over lunch 8212; he came up with several reasons why all the English-speaking economies are doing so well.
Krugman8217;s pet theory was that policy makers in English-speaking countries are, well, smarter. They tend to be economists with one foot in the academic world, whereas in Europe and Japan finance departments are run by career bureaucrats. 8220;In a world where the rules have suddenly changed, clever men and women who went to MIT are better able to adapt than bureaucrats whose only expertise is office politics,8221; he wrote.
He also thought, showing a personal bias, that policy-making might be better in English-speaking countries because they could 8220;read Milton Friedman inthe original8221;.
Certainly, most economic ideas 8212; and the vast majority of Nobel prizes for economics 8212; have come from English-speaking countries. Martin Weale, director of the National Institute for Economic and Social Research, said: 8220;Over the past 30 to 40 years, economic ideas have been generated in the US, and penetrated English-speaking countries earlier.8221; The English-speaking economy is not only the largest 8212; including three of the G7 countries 8212; but also the most innovative. From computers to pharmaceuticals to films to aerospace, it leads the way. Almost all of this is due to America, but for Australia, the UK and Ireland, speaking the same language as America probably helps them cling to its coat tails. In no industry is that clearer than in the fastest-growing industry of all, the Internet. French President Jacques Chirac recently lamented that the Internet was 8220;an Anglo-Saxon network8221; except he lamented it in French.
That is true: English has almost a monopoly hold on e-commerce. 8220;Weoften underestimate the advantage that the English language gives us,8221; said John Higgins, director of Britain8217;s Computer Software and Services Association. 8220;The reason that e-commerce is more advanced in English-language countries is because they have access to a large English-speaking market.8221; The culture industry, also a growth area, also benefits from the English language. The Spice Girls probably wouldn8217;t sell as many millions of CDs from Mexico to Thailand if no one could understand a word of their lyrics. Britain8217;s publishers flog almost 1.5 million worth of books abroad each year, which they probably wouldn8217;t be able to if they were written in Azeri. And if British films were in Azeri, they probably wouldn8217;t sell as well abroad.8221;
8220;In terms of exports, we do benefit,8221; said Neil McCartney, editor of the newsletter Screen Finance. 8220;British films often make more money in Europe than in the UK. People abroad are used to seeing English films, because they8217;ve been trained to watch American ones.8221;Britain sells nearly 2 billion of films and TV programmes abroad each year.
Being part of the richest language block in the world has helped other British industries that have nothing to do with language. 8220;Countries trade disproportionately with other countries that speak the same language,8221; said Ed Lazear, professor of economics at the Stanford Graduate School of Business. 8220;Portugal trades more with Brazil than with France; Britain does the same with the US.8221; With so many rich English-speaking markets around the world, English exporters have been more easily able to export their widgits. English is our most valuable export.
Britain also makes large sums of money teaching others how to speak English. Three-quarters of a million foreign students come here each year to learn English, spending more than 1bn on tuition fees, accommodation and food. While it may be good to teach others English, it may not be good for us to teach it too well. 8220;When the globalisation of the English language begins, it8217;sgood for us. But as it becomes more widely spoken, it8217;s no longer ours,8221; said Andrew Dilnot, director of the Institute for Fiscal Studies. 8220;When everyone speaks English, the benefits are spread around.8221; There already are examples of this happening. More and more non-native English speakers, such as Dutch and Belgians, are teaching English to other foreigners; European film-makers are making more films in English. Swissair, based in Zurich, has adopted English as its corporate language. This is also reflected in trade patterns. 8220;The UK does far less trade with other English-speaking countries now than it did in 1960,8221; said Lazear. 8220;Why? Because the French, Germans and Italians all speak English now, so it8217;s easier for you to trade with them.8221;
Weale thinks that speaking English as a mother tongue could actually be a disadvantage: 8220;Learning another language is useful mental training. English speakers gain from being able to read instructions on a computer, but suffer from mental laziness.8221;
ButLazear has a more convincing argument about why we should be glad we have persuaded the rest of the world to speak our language: imagine what things would be like if we hadn8217;t. He said: 8220;If you guys were speaking French right now, you8217;d really be in trouble.8221;
Observer News Service
