year since 2000 reaching $408 billion, second to the united states. according to a reason op ed in the wall street journal , china opened 1,800 universities between 2001 and 2014. china has nearly 5 million recently graduated scientists as of 2016, almost nine times the number in the united states. last year china sure papassed t united states and china once more for years it has been recruiting foreign scientists through the lucrative thousand talents placement program. if this transformation sounds familiar, that s for a reason something very similar happened in the united states after world war ii and changed the world as the economists jonathan wrote in a book, jump starting america, government funding for reserve and development in america