Why is human resource the first resource? (short answer)

With the advent of the era of knowledge economy, human resources have risen to the important position of the first resource. Wang Communication, vice president of China Personnel Science Research Institute of the Ministry of Personnel and director of the Institute of Personnel Talents, believes that human resources are the first resource, because people are the soul of everything, and only talents have subjective initiative. If we analyze this problem from the perspective of economics, we should start with five milestones in the emergence and development of talent theory. The first milestone: People's useful talents are the source of economic growth. /kloc-Adam Smith, a British economist in the 0 th and 8 th centuries, clearly regarded the growth of workers' skills as the source of social and economic progress and the growth of economic welfare in The Wealth of Nations. He said: "In the fixed capital of society, projects that can provide income or profits include not only material capital, but also the useful talents of all people in society." The second milestone: human capital is the most important capital. /kloc-at the end of 0/9, the British economist Marshall was the first to realize that human capital is the most important kind of capital. In his book Principles of Economics, he said: "Among all investments, the most valuable is the investment in people themselves." The third milestone: capital also includes intangible capital. At the beginning of the 20th century, irving fisher, an American economist, put forward a complete concept of capital for the first time in Essence of Capital and Income and Interest Rate Theory. He said: Anything that can bring benefits (whether tangible or intangible) can be called assets, and the market price of these assets is capital. The fourth milestone: the investment income of human capital is higher than that of material capital. In 1960s, American economist Theodore W.Schultz pushed this research to a new peak. He clearly pointed out that the income of human capital is higher than that of material capital. The fifth milestone: professional human capital is the real driving force for economic growth. Since 1980s, human capital scholars represented by Romer and Lucas have put forward the "new growth theory". This theory is also called "endogenous economic growth theory" because it adds human capital elements to the production function of classical learning. Lucas believes that "professional human capital" is the real driving force to promote economic growth. The return of human capital investment is higher than that of material investment. Wang Tong said that American economists were the first to shift their attention from material resources to human resources. He was the first to establish the theoretical system of human capital and human resources, and made a brand-new explanation of the driving force of economic development. Since the 1960s, under the influence of Schultz's theory, a large number of works on human capital and human resources have appeared. Since 197 1, five economists have been awarded the Nobel Prize for their contributions in this field. Schultz pointed out that in the growth of American economy for more than half a century, the input of material resources increased by 4.5 times and the income increased by 3.5 times; The investment in human capital has increased by 3.5 times, but the income has increased by 17.5 times. Professor Schultz also pointed out that from 19 19 to 1957, 49% of the GDP growth in the United States in 38 years is the result of human capital investment. After Schultz, economist Sacalopoulos analyzed the human capital investment (social and personal education investment) in 6 1 countries, and found that for developing countries, the return on physical capital investment in the 1960s was 15%, and the return on human capital investment was 20%. In the 1970s, these two figures were 13% and 15% respectively. The economist pointed out that increasing investment in human capital is of great significance to developing countries. A new interpretation of productive forces in the era of knowledge economy Wang Tongxun said that the importance of human resources can be explained from three aspects: labor contribution, income distribution and asset value. In terms of labor contribution, a skilled worker can only accomplish 1.5 to 1.6 times the workload of ordinary workers at best in the industrial economy era. Today, an excellent software engineer can accomplish 30 times the workload of an ordinary software engineer. In terms of income distribution, more than 85% of the cost of making cars in the industrial economy era was paid to ordinary workers and investors. Today, only 6% of their income is paid, and the remaining 84% is paid to designers, engineers, strategists, financiers, advertisers, marketers and managers. In today's developed countries, the labor cost generally only accounts for about 10%. In terms of asset value, most of the presidents of enterprises in the industrial economy era are steel kings and oil kings, with numerous assets and extremely rich. Today, the world's largest multinational company, General Motors, has the largest facilities and the largest inventory, with assets worth 40 billion dollars, but it is not the richest man in the world. The real richest man is Bill Gates. He got rich by knowledge and developed software successfully. His total assets have reached 200 billion dollars.