Because of this, the area is of increasing importance as a market for U.S. goods and services. Most of the nations of East Asia are small, but they compete increasingly with the United States in the international market of jobs and products. Yet, the people in these countries are more partners than competitors with the United States. United States' economic history in the twentieth century has been one of the gradual transfer of economic emphasis from the Atlantic to the Pacific. The importance of this area is not purely economic.
China is one of the two oldest surviving civilizations in the world today.
Its cultural and scientific contribution has been significant. The compass, the printing process, and gunpowder are but a few of the technological innovations first developed and used in China and later adopted by the West. The literary and artistic heritage of East Asian countries reached and maintained a high level of refinement as early or earlier than their Western counterparts. One example of this is the novel, which as a literary form was invented by the Japanese. This site is maintained by George Brown .