<<In the long term, the most optimistic scenario would see continued high growth rates in Asia and an acceleration of economic growth in Africa, coupled with a narrowing of income differences within rich and poor countries alike through more activist social policies (higher taxes on the rich, better public education, and greater equality of opportunity). Some economists, from Adam Smith onward, hoped that this rosy scenario of growing global equality would follow from the even spread of technological progress around the globe and the increasingly rational implementation of domestic policies.>>

<<Unfortunately, much gloomier forecasts seem more plausible. The trade and technology war between China and the United States, while perhaps understandable from a narrow U.S. strategic point of view, is fundamentally pernicious from the global point of view. It will prevent the spread of technology and hamper improvements in living standards across large swaths of the world. Slowing growth will make it harder to eradicate poverty and likely preserve current levels of global inequality. In other words, something like the opposite of the initial dynamic of globalization might come to be: the gap between American and Chinese middle classes may be preserved, but at the cost of the slower (or negative) income growth in both the United States and China. Improvements in real income would be sacrificed in order to freeze the pecking order of the global income distribution. The net real income gain for all concerned would be zero.>>