Li Kwoh-ting

Four professorships at Stanford University are also named for Dr. Li in the fields of economic development, engineering, medicine and Chinese culture. As of 2014, the holders in each field are: economic development (Xueguang Zhou), engineering (Yinyu Ye), medicine (Stanley N. Cohen) and Chinese culture (Mark Edward Lewis).

Yu argues that Li's policy-making can be explained by evolutionary economics. Two Yale economists, Gustav Ranis and John C.H. Fei, wrote the introductory essays to Li's 1995 book The Evolution of Policy Behind Taiwan's Development Success. Therefore, it can be interpreted that Ranis and Fei's views on economic policy are representative of Li's.

Taiwan's three-year stimulus package in 1991 to boost the private sector was NT $40 billion (US$1.5 billion) and included loans to small and medium-sized business and NT $20 billion for high-tech enterprises. The package also released 30,000 hectares of government owned land to the private sector, offered a five-year tax holiday to high-tech industries, allowed more foreign workers in to supplement the labor shortage in construction and manufacturing, and allowed more semi-finished industrial goods to be imported from Mainland China to be processed in Taiwan. The goal of the plan was to maintain the expansion of Taiwan's GDP and private investment from falling below their then annual levels of 6–7% and 10–15%.

In 1973 manufacturing's share in NDP was 36%, high even by standards of industrialized countries. Exports consisted of over half of GDP and consist of 90% of industrial goods, including textiles, clothes, leather and wood products, radio, television, cassette recorders, electronic calculators, sewing machines, machine tools, semi-conductors, and computers. This was a stark change from 1955's exports, which were 90% agricultural, consisting of mainly sugar and rice.

He held a number of leadership positions in industry and government in Taiwan, including that of economic minister from 1965 to 1969 and finance minister from 1969 to 1976. After 1976 he was appointed "Minister without portfolio" and promoted science and technology in Taiwan. In 1968, he received the Ramon Magsaysay Award for government service. He created a policy that helped attract entrepreneurs in the tech industry and helped fund Taiwan's electronics companies, which led to Taiwan's primacy as a producer of computer parts. Li also helped build the Hsinchu Science Park, which later became known as Taiwan's Silicon Valley. The park is one of the world's leading centers for semiconductor manufacturing and industrial and computer technology development. As of 2018 more than 500 high-tech companies reside in the park. Li was also a senior adviser to the President of the Republic of China, Chen Shui-bian.

Taiwan experienced GDP growth of 10.6% a year from 1965 to 1979 with no deterioration in income distribution, an improvement in literacy, a longer life expectancy than almost all other developing countries, increases in manufacturing earnings of 15% a year from 1960 to 1979, and unemployment at less than 2% since 1970. As of 1988, income per person was three to ten times higher than China. In 1953 Taiwan's per capita income was below the Mediterranean countries, and well below any Latin American country and Malaysia, whereas by 1982 Taiwan's per capita income had reached US$2500, much higher than Malaysia, Brazil, and Mexico, and on par with Portugal, Argentina, and Chile.

Ian Little writes, "Government expenditure fell from 19.6% of GNP in 1963 to 16% in 1973, whereas [in 1979] revenue rose from 21% to 22.4%." According to Wade however, government expenditure as a share of GNP increased from 20% in 1963 to 23% in 1973 and to 27% in 1980–81. However, government revenue increased from 19.3% in 1963 to 25.8% in 1973.

Fei argues that two main types of forces govern policy evolution: objective and subjective. Objective forces are predetermined conditions, encompassing physical environments, external economic conditions, etc. Subjective forces include personal beliefs, economic knowledge, memories, experiences, and "common sense." Fei believes that political beliefs and ideology are the strongest factors in shaping economic policy-making, and thus is an ongoing process. In following with the concept of evolutionary economics, Fei believes that economic policy must change to suit new and ever-changing situations. Therefore, policy should not be static when created and instead evolve and be improved on to adapt to new situations. Li himself claims that the liberalization of the Taiwanese economy was a gradual process rather than an abrupt one following the international popularity of free market thought in the 1960s and 1970s.

Li indicates that this was the main difference between Taiwan's policy and those in Latin American countries, and that this method of managing the economy led to an overall more responsible government and transparent taxation system. Li claims that during the 1950s–70s, the liberalization of Taiwan's economy was an unintended effect of their new policy, and it wasn't until 1983 that such "externally-oriented growth" was seen as beneficial and the merging of international competition in the domestic market was encouraged. Furthermore, Li says that Taiwan's government was guided at the start with the principle that private property and a market environment which favored private businesses were to be encouraged. Li writes:

Although Taiwan experienced relative economic success over the course of its history along with the other Four Asian Tigers which employed similar economic policies as Taiwan, the lack of the same "miraculous" development in Latin American countries that employed the same principles brings into question whether Li's policies can be fully transferred and result in unequivocal success. Li also did not consider external factors that helped Taiwan's initial economic growth, such as the economic and military aid provided by the US government from 1949–1965, which helped to dampen inflation.

He graduated from National Central University (Nanjing University) in 1930 and studied physics at the Cambridge University in 1934. He returned to Mainland China and spent many of his years in politics and economics before he fled from the Chinese Communist Party to Taiwan in July 1948 with the Nationalist Party. He became the president of the Taiwan Shipbuilding Corporation in 1951 and was appointed as a member of the Industrial Development Commission responsible for the planning and economic development of Taiwan in 1953. In 1959 he became the head of the Industrial Development and Investment Center under the Council for United States Aid.

Li's residence in Taipei is now a museum. The traditional 1930s style Japanese house was Li's home from 1972 to 2001. Taipei's former mayor, Hau Lung-bin, recalls fondly, "I was so impressed by its furnishings [...] They showed how prudent he was, and he read plenty of books and periodicals." Additionally, to further honor Li, in 2011 an asteroid (239611 Likwohting) was named after him.

Li Kwoh-ting (traditional Chinese: 李國鼎; simplified Chinese: 李国鼎; pinyin: Lǐ Guódǐng; 28 January 1910 – 31 May 2001) was a Taiwanese economist and politician best known as the "Father of Taiwan's Economic Miracle" and referred to by the New York Times as the "Godfather of Technology" in Taiwan for his work in transforming Taiwan's economy from an agrarian-based system into one of the world's leading producers of information and telecommunications technology.

Li was born in Nanjing, Qing China, on January 28, 1910 and died at the National Taiwan University Hospital in Taipei, Taiwan on May 31, 2001.