Source of this article: Guanghua School of Management, Peking University
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Warren Buffett suddenly accepted an exclusive interview and arranged "afterlife"
Dear students, distinguished relatives, colleagues and friends,
Good afternoon, everyone! Today, we gathered in the Centennial Lecture Hall to witness the successful completion of their studies and open a new chapter in their lives by more than 1,500 graduates of Peking University Guanghua in the 2024 class of Guanghua of Peking University. On behalf of all the teachers, students and staff of Guanghua School of Management, please allow me to express my warmest congratulations and most sincere wishes to all students! At the same time, I also hope that you will give a round of applause to your family, friends, classmates, and teachers who have accompaned, supported, and encouraged you over the years...... Invite them to share the excitement and joy of graduation.
Graduation means parting, and from tomorrow onwards, everyone will be "leaning forward and chasing another crazy adventure under the sky" (Jack. Kerouac, "On the Road"). When we part, we don't say goodbye. Bob Dlyan once sang in the song, "Goodbye is too good a word, so I'm going to just say 'goodbye.'" ”（Goodbye is too good a word, so I will just say farewell）。 Indeed, under the firmament, the world is vast, when will we say goodbye? Here, I sincerely wish you all. On the road, no matter what decision you make, what path you choose, no matter whether the future is rainy or sunny, there is one thing that my colleagues and I are convinced of: the world is waiting for you to come, waiting for you to travel through the mountains and seas of time and the Gobi sand dunes to ignite the fire of truth, passion and beauty. We wish you all a safe journey!
In addition to blessings, I would like to give you a word of advice and encourage you to share with your classmates. In an era where all sorts of "narrative traps" are rampant, I would like to remind everyone not to fall into them on their future journeys. Behavioral economist and Nobel laureate Robert Shiller said in The Economics of Narratives, "Stories are the most powerful carriers of meaning...... There are stories that can go viral and these are 'narratives', and narratives affect all aspects of economic life by influencing human behaviour." In Schiller's discourse system, narrative is equal to facts plus subjective reactions, so that narratives' understanding of the real world is not entirely based on objective facts, but also on the complex psychological reactions produced by these narratives. If a narrative is based on the narrator's distortion of objective facts or out of some narrow or even evil motives, and begins to spread like a virus (Schiller calls this a "viewpoint virus"), and then becomes the dominant public belief of the economy and society at a given time, and these "viewpoint viruses" bring substantial harm to the economy, society and people's lives through the negative impact on people's psychology and behavior, this constitutes what I call a "narrative trap" here. Human history is littered with such "narrative traps". The Dutch tulip bubble in the 17th century, the Japanese real estate bubble in the 90s, and the dot-com bubble at the beginning of this century all originated from various "narrative traps" brought about by anti-intellectualism and irrational fanaticism.
We live in an era of "pan-narrative", where the rise of social media and geopolitical upheaval have turned our world upside down, and narratives are all around us. In such a broken and fractured world, full of noise and illusion, with the cooperation of fragmented time and fragmented attention, deep thinking finally disappears in rush and impetuousness, lies and polarized views spread like a virus, far faster than the facts, and the vast majority of us can only give up the right to think independently with a consumption mentality, and fall into various "narrative traps" knowingly or unknowingly. Falling into these "narrative traps" makes it impossible for people to reach a consensus in the face of important empirical facts, so that rational arguments often turn into emotional catharsis or even deliberately created antagonism, which exacerbates people's anti-intellectualism, fear, anger and even hatred.
What is sad is that even those who are effective, have strong thinking and acting skills, and are prone to fall into self-proof or other evidence of a series of false propositions without knowing it when faced with many "narrative traps" about China's economy and policies, global markets, technological changes, etc. However, there is nothing more dangerous than answering the wrong question correctly. Meaningless and emotional arguments about false propositions based on "narrative traps" and tedious chewing over and over again often distort people's perceptions of problems and basic facts, kidnap solutions to real problems, and hold back key policies and reforms that should have been rolled out long ago, seriously preventing people from doing important things that are necessary but difficult to improve.
To reject the "narrative trap", we need to have the ability to think independently, to delve into the underlying logic behind various opinions or narratives, to take the acquisition of ideas and wisdom as our unshirkable moral responsibility, and to find those simple and unchanging in the midst of change. "China Peaking" is a recent narrative of China's economy that has been widely circulated and far-reaching. Based on the "facts" of China's economic slowdown, the summit commentators exaggerate pessimistic arguments about China's economy: the continued decline in real estate investment and housing prices has exacerbated the risks of real estate, the financial system, and local government debt, which are already closely intertwined; Population and labor dividends are drifting away; "Overcapacity" leads to insufficient investment momentum; The economic downturn and industrial adjustment have brought employment pressure...... Wait a minute. Based on this, the summit theorists believe that China's economy has entered a downward channel from now on, and it will become more and more passive in the great power game...... Because we believe in the narrative of China's ascension to the top, we see the various changes that are taking place in the global political and economic landscape: some join the blockade camp, some stand on the high ground of values and morality to point fingers, some re-pick sides, some gloat, and some hesitate with a sad face......
Has China's economy really peaked? The ultimate driver of economic growth is the growth of total factor productivity (TFP) growth brought about by the technological revolution and the improvement of resource allocation efficiency (the correlation coefficient between GDP growth and TFP growth in mainland China was as high as 81% between 1978 and 2022). Because of the stagnation of the technological frontier and the difficulty of mechanization and economies of scale in the service sector, which has gradually dominated economic life, it is difficult for a country to sustain sustained productivity growth after industrialization. After the mainland basically completed the process of industrialization in 2010, the average annual growth rate of the mainland's total factor productivity has dropped from 4% between 1978 and 2009 to 1.3-1.8% in the past decade, which largely explains the slowdown in the mainland's economic growth. Insufficient TFP growth is a global challenge, and after more than 40 years of rapid economic growth, we are also seeing this challenge in China. This obviously provides "empirical facts" for China's ascent to the top and the soil for pessimism.
However, the long wind begins at the end of the apple. At the same time, we should note that the structural forces that support China's total factor productivity growth to achieve a V-shaped rebound and return to the level of more than 2% are gradually emerging. Although we have completed the great industrial revolution in China, the rapid development of AI and big data technology, the imminent energy transition, and the rich industrial system that China has formed have brought about a vast space for "re-industrialization" (i.e., any industry can use digital transformation and energy transition to "industrialization" again), and "re-industrialization" will bring great possibilities for total factor productivity growth and sustained economic growth. A decisive start to structural reforms, focusing on solving the structural problems that constrain China's TFP growth (low disposable income, insufficient investment in the public service system, and the dual structure of urban and rural areas), will also become another source of China's TFP growth...... Caught in the "narrative trap of China's ascension to the top" and treating the challenge of transition with a credible response as a long-term unsolvable structural problem, pessimists of China's economy may lose an entire future.
To reject the "narrative trap", we need to have a deeper and broader anchor in life, build faith in a better future, and always maintain the determination to change and the courage to act. In the face of beauty, we must do our best not to give up, we must believe that our victory must be the victory of ideals, the victory of entrepreneurship, and the victory of the times. It was also in these days that an article entitled "How to Spend the Garbage Time of History" went viral on social media. It's no surprise that this narrative about the times we live in has been hotly debated and even widely resonated. In fact, few times in human history have been so troubling as today: the global economy is generally challenged by under-productivity growth and underinvestment; Unbalanced development, unequal distribution of income and wealth, and solidified social strata are still stubborn diseases that hinder the evolution of human civilization. Climate warming leads to frequent extreme weather; The smoke and flames of war are never really far away; A serious crisis of confidence spreads among people and between countries. In the face of the great changes of the times, people panicked, and their inner fortresses began to collapse, and in the face of setbacks in the process of moving forward, they felt sorry for themselves, felt sorry for themselves, and were even willing to lose without a fight......
Are we really living in a time when garbage is going to be a garbage time in history? We need to see that we are at the beginning of a new "technological revolution", the significance of which is equal to or even greater than the leap-forward changes brought by the great industrial revolution to human civilization. We need to see that we still have a large number of industries that urgently need investment, a large number of structural problems that need to be solved urgently, and increasing investment in these areas will effectively increase the growth rate of total factor productivity; All the more we need to see that our time has created, and will continue to produce, a large number of people who have changed their lives and are able to turn confusion and fear about the future into positive and constructive forces. They dare to challenge fate, are determined, persevering, and like bitterness as much as they like sweet; They are faithful to their loves, unrepentant, and take care of their dreams even when there is little hope of success, "as if they had created a faith to serve a god who could fall at any moment" (Borges). Because of them, the flowers are eternal, the sky is complete, and this era is destined to become an era that people will talk about in the future.
"Any history that can leave a name is a history of people like a poem; Its value depends on the character of these individuals and the power they display" (Lytton Strachey). Class of 2024 graduates, the torrent of the era of Mo Zhineng is rushing, and we have no choice but to experience, grow, and accept the repeated beatings of fate. I earnestly wish you all to be thoughtful, determined, hopeful, and compassionate. If this is the case, everyone will eventually live as TAs!
Finally, I would like to say goodbye to you with a few lines of poetry by my favorite German poet Rilke.
How fate is gone, in the poem, never to return,
How does it become a blurred image in the poem?
Everything that has happened always precedes our judgment,
We can't catch up, we can't make out of it.
Do not be afraid, if the dead pass by you,
Look at them calmly.
The sorrows of countless people make you unique.
What we've seen, what has happened,
The rhetoric of those times was not spoken for us.
What victory can be attributed to? Holding on is everything.
Congratulations again! Happy Graduation! ■