Former Premier of the People's Republic of China, Zhu Rongji, passed away on last week at the age of 97, with the country raising its flags to half-mast in commemoration of one of its wisest custodians.
His term as the head of state was not a long one—merely 5 years from 1998 to 2003—but his work was paramount to transform the country from the example that American mothers used to convince their children to eat all their dinner, to the economic powerhouse it is today.
This work began in earnest during his role as Vice Premier, a position of much greater power than an American Vice President. Under Premier Deng Xiaoping, Zhu executed critical market reforms in areas of banking, taxation, and government employment.
This included allowing thousands of government-owned businesses to fail, trusting a new private sector to support employment as the state sought to get tens of millions of workers off of the so-called "iron rice bowl" of cradle-to-grave welfare. As VP, Zhu also saw a
