改革开放后，许多精英尤其是主流经济学家在各种媒体上批评毛泽东时代糟得很，特别是经济方面很糟，直接证据是那个时代人们生活水平很低，建国快三十年了，才勉强维持温饱，象自行车、手表、缝纫机等在毛泽东时代快要结束了都还没有普及，更不要提象电视、冰箱、洗衣机、计算机、汽车了，等等。据此，他们批评毛泽东不懂经济，经济搞不上去又主要是因为政治方面束缚和限制，也由此彻底否定了毛泽东的时代。他们的推理和辩证逻辑，很长时间以来没有得到有力的反驳。顶多论证毛泽东时代起点低，取得当时那样的发展实属不易，或者论证改革开放后取得的成就是建立在毛泽东时代打下的基础上。但普通百姓不在乎数据，切身的感受的确是现在比那个时代财富要丰富了，日子要好过多了，这一无可否认的事实也让普通人很困惑，这其中的奥秘到底在哪里呢？
笔者无意中在网上看到美国加州大学伯克利分校经济学系德隆写的一篇文章《聚宝盆：20世纪的财富增长 》，该文分析论证二十世纪在美国技术革命引起的财富增长与生活水平改善到底有多大，与19世纪的人比起来，现在的人们生活水平到底有多么不同，19世纪人们为什么会争论工业革命值不值，工业革命到底是提高了人们生活水平还是降低了人们的生活水平。我发现作者的例举的事实、论述的经济发展历史以及结论非常有意义，能为解决当前国内关于毛泽东时代的某些争论提供一些参考。于是，我又用搜索引擎查找有关二十世纪经和技术济发展带来生活水平改善的文章，发现有许多类似的文章。下面，我将德隆1998年的一篇《缓慢靠近乌托邦》AN EXPLOSION OF MATERIAL WEALTH 一章摘译如下：

“在标志着中世纪结束的农业发明和商业革命期间，财富和技术的进步实在很缓慢。中世纪历史学者讲述那时人们用了几个世纪才使水车、重型犁具等关键性发明得到广泛传播使用。而且，在这个时期，技术进步引起了人口的增加，结果几乎没有改善人们的生活水准。
甚至在工业革命早期，在生活水准方面产生的还仅仅是“改良性”而不是“革命性”的变化。除了象铁路、纺织、织布等工具的发明是个特例外，绝大多数该时期的发明革新是关于产品如何生产和运输的革新发明，是一种新型的资本出现，而不是消费品的出现。人们的生活水平得到改善，但那时人们的生活方式仍然没有什么变化。18世纪和19世纪见证了一个更快而且完全不同的变化。人类有史以来第一次技术能力增长走出了人口的增长和自然资源的限制。在19世纪最后的25年里，在发达国家，如英国，比利时，美国或澳大利亚，普通居民的生活水平已经是工业化前的三倍。
然而，变化步子如此缓慢以至于人们，或者说至少是那些贵族知识分子，可能会认为他们一千年以前的祖先的效率与他们那个时代一样。 西塞罗，一个罗马时代的贵族，作家和政治家，如果在汤马斯.杰弗逊（译者注：美国第三任总统、《独立宣言》的写作者汤马斯·杰弗逊）的厂子里生活也许感觉上几乎和在罗马时代没有什么区别。只不过是杰弗逊时代的犁更好一些罢了，帆船也得到了一些改进。但是这些还不足以让精英产生一种生活方式上实质改变的感觉。而且，当杰弗逊家的一个奴隶可能和当西塞罗家的一个奴隶没什么两样。
变化的步子如此缓慢以至于引起了19世纪早期的知识分子争论工业革命是否值得，它是改善了还是降低了人们的生活水准。结果观点截然不同，象约翰这样的乐观的自由派与悲观的一方一直争论到19世纪四十年代。但是，到了二十世纪，人们的生活水平发生了翻天覆地的变化。物质财富增长如此之大以至于几乎难以衡量。
以1895年蒙哥马利沃德消费品样本为例，当时单速自行车价格为65美元（笔者注：蒙哥马利沃德是上世纪之交美国最大的邮购零售商），从那以后，自行车价格以“名义”美元计算已经翻了一番（实际上是通货膨胀的结果）。但是今天自行车按实际价值算的话，已经便宜得许多了。它的“真实”价格应当是：为生产它花费的工作量和工作时间。在1895年，大概要花费普通美国工人260小时的工作量来积攒下足够多的钱来购买一辆单速自行车。今天，一个普通美国工人用不到八个小时的工作成果就可以买到一辆性能更好的自行车。
以自行车作为标准，通过计算能买多少辆自行车来衡量财富，今天一个美国工人比1895年时的工人要富裕36倍了。如果以其它一些商品来作标准，结果可能会完全不一样。一把办公室椅子如果按花费普通工人工作日去购买它已经便宜了12.5倍，一架史蒂文钢琴仅仅便宜2倍，而一个银的茶匙还贵了25%。
因此，回答“今天的我们比一个世纪前富了多少？”这样一个问题取决于你看重哪些商品。对于许多个人服务来说--比如请一个人来给你开门或擦亮你家的银茶匙--你可能会发现在1895年和在1990年的平均财富没有什么变化，当时的一个小时的服务的价值和现在是一样的。但对于大规模制造的商品--比如自行车--我们今天已经富了36倍。”

看到这里，如果我用查找替换功能把该文中的“美国”替换成“中国”，把“工业革命”替换成“毛泽东时代”，把“今天”或“当代美国”替换成“改革开放后”，我们会发现替换后，文章照样能读下来。这是一个很有意思的类比：与毛泽东时代相比，改革开放后中国经济的极大发展带来的生活水平提高的原因和过程，跟美国相较于十九世纪，在二十世纪经济技术发展带来的生活水平提高的原因和过程几乎是一模一样的，除了美国在工业革命用了近百年的时间而中国只用了近三十年时间这一个差异。美国精英分子在十九世纪感觉不到工业革命带来生活水平和生活方式有明显的改善与中国当今精英分子指责毛泽东时代没有极大改善人们生活水平情形差不多。美国在工业革命期间人口增长导致生活水平没有得到明显改善与中国在毛泽东时代的情形也几乎一致，只不过是中国人口在工业化之前基数更大一些。如果我把美国1890年到1990年实际GDP发展曲线的时间轴线压缩成60年，当你看到二者是如此近似时，你也不要感到非常吃惊。甚至连争论都是如此相似：美国在十九世纪争论工业革命到底值不值，是提高了还是降低了美国人的生活水准等“历史往事”与我们今天讨论毛泽东时代到底有没有是好还是坏，人们生活水平有没有改善也如出一辙，只不过是我们国内的争论里面掺杂着政治因素，仅仅因人们生活水平没有得到明显的提高而全盘否定毛泽东时代的经济发展过程，显然是精英们在这个问题上并没有表现出讲求客观与公正的学术原则。

中国和美国在工业化时期与工业化之后经济发展和生活水平趋势存在如此多的一致，说明了什么呢？我认于至少说明毛泽东时代的中国仅仅用了30年走完了美国用了近一百年才完成的工作化，其效率应值得嘉许而不是批评。而且，在毛泽东时期，中国在完成工业化过程人们生活水平没有得到足够的改善并不是什么例外，正象美国1895年时的普通人感觉生活和一千年前相比也没有什么提高和改善一样，都不能成为指责的对象，也不应成为否定美国工业革命和中国工业化重要意义的依据；中国改革开放后人们生活水平提高，大部分应归因于技术进步和工作化的完成，这就跟美国在二十世纪人们财富增加的原因一样。

经济技术发展给人类带来的影响和意义是深远的，人类究竟向前发展得更好还是变得更坏，这些问题已经引起许多人的关注。 在网上，普通人都不难看到西方经济学家有关这方面的文章，我相信，中国所谓的著名经济学者尤其是那些留洋的经济学家就更不难看到类似于这样的经济发展历史的文章或研究，为什么这些著名的“学者”，如厉以宁、张维迎等，从来没有发表一个公正客观的研究文章？我们不需要你们给毛泽东时代定调，只要有一个稍微严谨的分析、推理过程就可以了。

最后要对那些自视为主流、坐在宝塔尖上的学者和精英们说一声：请你们尊重历史，否则历史就不会尊重你们。

附德隆原文和网址：http://www.bos.frb.org/economic/nerr/rr1998/q3/delo98_3.htm

AN EXPLOSION OF MATERIAL WEALTH

Between the invention of agriculture and the commercial revolution that marked the end of the Middle Ages, wealth and technology developed slowly indeed. Medieval historians tell of the centuries it took for key inventions like the watermill or the heavy plow to diffuse across the landscape. And, during this period, increases in technology led to increases in the population, with little if any appearing as improvements in the median standard of living.

Even the early years of the Industrial Revolution produced more "improvements" than "revolutions" in standards of living. With the railroad and the spinning and weaving of textiles as important exceptions, most innovations of that period were innovations in how goods were produced and transported, and in new kinds of capital, but not in consumer goods. Standards of living improved, but styles of life remained much the same. The eighteenth and nineteenth centuries saw a faster and different kind of change. For the first time, technological capability outran population growth and natural resource scarcity. By the last quarter of the nineteenth century, the typical inhabitant of the leading economies — a Briton, a Belgian, an American, or an Australian — had perhaps three times the standard of living of someone in a preindustrial economy.

Still, so slow was the pace of change that people, or at least aristocratic intellectuals, could think of their predecessors of a thousand years before as effectively their contemporaries. Marcus Tullius Cicero, a Roman aristocrat, author, and politician, might have felt more or less at home in the company of Thomas Jefferson. The plows were better in Jefferson's time. Sailing ships were much improved. But these might have been insufficient to create a sense of a qualitative change in the order of life for the elite. And being a slave of Jefferson was probably a lot like being a slave of Cicero.

So slow was the pace of change that intellectuals in the early nineteenth century debated whether the Industrial Revolution was worthwhile. Was it an improvement or a degeneration in the standard of living? And opinions were genuinely pided, with as optimistic a liberal as John Stuart Mill coming down on the side of the "pessimists" as late as the end of the 1840s. But, in the twentieth century, standards of living exploded. The growth in material wealth has been so great as to make it nearly impossible to measure.

Consider a sample of consumer goods available through Montgomery Ward in 1895, when a one-speed bicycle cost $65. Since then, the price of a bicycle measured in "nominal" dollars has more than doubled (as a result of inflation). But the bicycle today is much less expensive in terms of the measure that truly counts, its "real" price: the work and sweat needed to earn its cost. In 1895, it took perhaps 260 hours' worth of the average American worker's production to amass enough money to buy a one-speed bicycle. Today, an average American worker can buy one of higher quality for less than 8 hours' worth of production.

On the bicycle standard, measuring wealth by counting up how many bicycles it can buy, the average American worker today is 36 times richer than his or her counterpart was in 1895. Other commodities would tell a different story. An office chair has become 12.5 times cheaper in terms of the time it takes the average worker to produce enough to pay for it. A Steinway piano or an accordion is only twice as cheap. A silver teaspoon is 25 percent more expensive.

Thus, the answer to the question "How much wealthier are we today than our counterparts of a century ago?" depends on which commodities you view as important. For many personal services — having a butler to answer the door and polish your silver spoons — you would find little difference in average wealth between 1895 and 1990. An hour of a butler's time costs about the same then as now. But for mass-produced manufactured goods — like bicycles — we are wealthier by as much as 36 times.

THE RANGE OF GOODS AND SERVICES

Such calculations substantially understate the improvement in our material well-being, for they fail to consider the enormous expansion in the range of goods and services we can consume.

So when we are told that the standard of living in the United States in 1900 was roughly equal to $12,000 per worker per year (at today's prices), we tend to think about what we could buy today with $12,000. But that is not at all what material standards of living were like then. Imagine, instead, what our life would be if we had $12,000 to spend, but we were required to spend it all on commodities that were around in 1900: no fluoridated toothpaste, electric toaster ovens, clothes-washing machines, dishwashers, synthetic fiber-blend clothes, radios, plastic bottles, intercontinental telephones, xerox machines, notebook computers, automobiles, airplanes, or steel-framed skyscrapers. How would we calculate the impact on our living standards?
And here I believe we can gain insight by looking not at economic statistics, but at one of the best-selling novels of the 1890s, Looking Backward, by Edward Bellamy — a wooden, poorly-written book that sold in extraordinary numbers because it offered the late nineteenth century a vision of Utopia.

In Looking Backward, the narrator, who is living in the year 2000, is asked by his host: "Would you like to hear some music?"

He expects his host to play the piano — a social accomplishment of upper-class women of the time. Instead, the narrator is stupefied to find that, in the year 2000, his host need merely touch "one or two screws," and immediately the room was "filled with music; filled, not flooded, for, by some means, the volume of melody had been perfectly graduated to the size of the apartment. 'Grand!' he cries. 'Bach must be at the keys of that organ; but where is the organ?'"

His host has called the orchestra on the telephone; in fact he has a choice of orchestras, four playing at any moment. At the end of the nineteenth century, this was considered Utopia — the choice of four orchestras played through a speakerphone. To Bellamy's narrator, this was "the limit of human felicity already attained . . ." What if someone were to take him to Tower Records? Or Blockbuster Video? His heart would stop.

We do not think of our ability to listen to high-fidelity, go-anywhere, listen-to-anything music as remarkable. We do not daily give thanks for our cassette players and genuflect in front of our CD collections. We do not reflect that they have brought us to the limit of human felicity. We do not think about it at all.

This is the most important piece of the history of the twentieth century. In the twentieth century, the human race passed from the realm of necessity, where providing basic food, clothing, and shelter took up the lion's share of economic productive potential, to the realm of economic freedom: in which our collective production is largely made up of conveniences and luxuries.

A VAST AND GROWING ECONOMIC GULF

This upward jump in productivity and wealth has not been confined to the industrial core of the world economy. In 1987, about 97 percent of households in Greece owned a television set. In Mexico, there was one automobile for every sixteen people, one television for every eight, one telephone for every ten.

Nonetheless, while economies that were relatively rich at the start of the twentieth century have, by and large, seen their material wealth and prosperity explode, those nations and economies that were relatively poor have grown richer, but more slowly. A country that was 10 percent richer than another in 1870, was (on average) likely to be about 15 percent richer in 1995. A country that was 30 percent richer in 1870, was (on average) likely to be about 45 percent richer in 1995. Thus, the relative gulf between rich and poor economies has grown steadily over the past century.