China is catching up to the USA, while Japan is being left behind
The conclusion is actually quite contrary to the title, and far more interesting: the author uses that example to debunk the idea that more research leads to more innovation and more prosperity.<p>I have been tinkering around the same idea for a while, thinking that the state of a country&#x27;s democracy matters way more than its research output.<p>I&#x27;ll quote this article in the future!<p>In his own words: &quot;Does any of it matter? Many people believe, or assume, that great output in terms of research articles should cause economic prosperity and innovation. I have post entitled Does academic research cause economic growth? that makes the contrary point. That is, though China is catching up in terms of scientific output, this may be a consequence of their prosperity: they can now afford to have their very best minds work on producing research articles. It is much easier for rich countries to fund people so that they can publish in Nature. So being rich will allow you to catch up. But Japan shows that you can be a very rich country and choose not to produce many great research articles. In the least, this establishes that you do not need to produce many great research articles to be prosperous.&quot;