the importance of keeping up with the times

another article that i recently read on economist.com, dealt with a little bit of history. how appropriate for this class right? yea, that's what i thought when i read it. lucked out i guess. anyways, the article essentially lays down the importance of taking advantage of an absolute advantage. sorry for the redundancy. it also gives a real life example of how important it is in today's growing world (largely the fault of globalization) to 'keep up with the times,' and accept the fact that the free-market society is sweeping across the globe. resistance is futile.

this is most definitely the case with the country of ghana...not so much with north korea. back in the 1960's, the gnp per head for each of the two countries was approximately $390 american. however, a series of events have lead north korea to currently posses the 9th largest economy in the world, and ghana to be stuck at the 94th. to make a long story short, when ghana gained independence from britain back in the 1957, the first president instilled a pan-african socialist ideology within the country. back then, ghana had a world-wide absolute advantage in producing cocoa. the administration of ghana unfortunately set the market price of cocoa at 25 cents per pound, and stepped in as the third party in international trade. they sold the cocoa to the rest of the world at market price, which was 50 cents per pound, using the profits for other governmental operations. this caused the cocoa farmers to abstain from farming cocoa, and they turned to farming other crops. this, combined with a number of extremely high tariffs on imports, created a protectionist philosophy that kept ghana's economy stuck in the past.

north korea, who was an economic equal to ghana until their independence, slowly crept up in the 'world rankings.' the north korean government essentially eliminated all of their tariffs, and issued corporate incentives for firms that traded internationally. even though they had to 'sacrifice' a generation (by sacrifice i mean that north korea had a very educated work force at the time, who mainly farmed. however, they stopped farming, and moved to working in the factories), it proved to greatly benefit the welfare of the country as a whole. north korea recognized the change in the international playing field, and largely reaped the benefits.

once again, this may seem to be a vague connection to civilization iv. lets just assume that i play the game so often and so avidly that i have lost all other intellectual skills, and am having a hard time thinking about anything else other than the game. so it's hard for me to make any connections with real life because i don't know anything else any more. i apologize if that made no sense at all, im on adderall. but through my gameplay, i have come to realize that just as in real life, the free-market society reigns supreme. trading freely with everyone not only builds your economy unlike any other method, but it builds trust and good relations with others. if you are seen as an empire that is open to trade, and will grant the occasional favor or sacrifice, then you will be payed back in the future. in a global world, much like in the game, in a large scope, free trade benefits everyone involved.