by Greg Boone
The First UIC Financial Forum was hosted by the Division of Business and Management on November 21, 2008.
"For a College that's positioned to broaden our students international outlook," Professor Kwok told the audience at Friday's lecture, "we need to have someone who knows China." Rupert Hoogewerf, the manager of China's Rich List spoke about entrepreneurship in a speech called "The Entrepreneur and the Economics of China". "If you look at the last 30 years, you'll see that it's really the last 10 years that are the wealth creating years. It's the entrepreneurs that really tell the story of modern China."
Rupert said the list currently consisted of 1,000 people making more than $100 million US dollars. The list was inaccurate because his organization had not been able to find and added all qualified to the list. He estimated the actual figure was closer to about a million people with more than $1 million US. His organization focused closely on entrepreneurs. He said the wealthiest of these individuals had roughly $6 billion. The unique thing about the Chinese wealthy was that they were almost exclusively first generation, in other words, entrepreneurs. They were people who had started from nothing but an idea and worked diligently to realize that idea into a million dollar enterprise. Most of these people were coming out of Guangdong Province, and on average these people achieved Rich List Status in just 15 years.
Rupert represented the incredible growth of Rich List Qualified Individuals pointed to a greater trend of rising and more confident Chinese entrepreneurs, and put modern China in "an exceptional period in Chinese history," that started with the Opening Doors Policy. He said this was the third great development of the private sector in all of Chinese history. The point of keeping a Rich List, was that it gave people a better understanding of these individuals, and to distinguish them from others who might be making their money in less scrupulous ways. In the ten years he had kept the list, the biggest change he had seen was a "growth of confidence" in entrepreneurs to be open about their wealth.
What did all this mean for the students? He said the Rich List reflected a "revolution" that started in China. For most westerners, China was a place where private enterprise was completely forbidden-Hoogewerf made the comparison with present day's North Korea-and there was no way for anyone in China to get rich. "Today," he said "I don't think there is anybody, anywhere in the world, who doubts that China has some of the best entrepreneurs in the world." He said the image of wealth had changed, there's been a revolution. "Entrepreneurs are the pride and joy of their local governments. When times are good they pay taxes. When times are bad, the government returns the favor and come to their aid, as it is happening now."
Photographer: Tong Xin / Chen Mengxing
四维通讯社
