[23] In addition, South Korea and Taiwan are among the largest manufacturers of consumer technology globally, while Hong Kong is widely recognized as a leading worldwide financial centre.

[35] Han China hosted the largest unified population in East Asia, the most literate and urbanised, the most economically developed, and the most technologically and culturally advanced civilisation in the region at the time.

This productive economy generated substantial tax revenues to fund a competent, credible, and efficient political bureaucracy that administered a vast empire and possessed the world's most advanced science and technology.

[25][43][27][44] Throughout this period, China outperformed its fellow East Asian and distant European counterparts regarding technological development and economic growth, culminating in its ability to maintain a massive territorial empire throughout succeeding medieval Chinese dynasties.

Japan during the Yayoi period engaged in intensive rice agriculture in paddy fields introduced from southern China via the Ryukyu Islands which developed a manorial feudal economy similar to that of medieval Europe.

[61] As medieval Japanese society became more advanced, East Asia's first marketplaces began to take root as entrepreneurial merchants and artisans supplied manufactured goods to opening markets throughout the entire country.

Major cities would grow into silk, porcelain, and cotton centers providing work for a lot of people and made inter-regional trade easier so merchants and consumers participated in a local market system to exchange goods and services with one another.

In addition, improvements in agriculture contributed to economic growth as new strains of rice resisted droughts and disease, and fertilizers allowed double cropping of fields with better irrigation techniques to help farmers produce greater surpluses.

As the inflow of coins from Ming China disrupted in the latter half of the Japanese economy during the 16th century, rice, gold and silver served as a medium of exchange and evaluating monetary value.

Villages, which operated as largely independent units, also expanded with economic activity gradually shifting from subsistence farming to a more sophisticated commercial agricultural based and relatively advanced technology greatly improved the quality of domestic Japanese made handicrafts such as silk production, textile weaving, and sake brewing.

[24] The economy of ancient Gojoseon prospered due to improvements in agricultural technology (as iron tools were introduced from China) coupled with an abundance of natural resources like gold, silver, copper, tin, and zinc during the second half of the first millennium CE.

[72] Despite the high standard of living, society was burdened by feudalism as peasants made up 80% of the entire population and excessive authoritative government administration that existed in medieval Japan and Europe.

[72][73][75] The Joseon government also subsidized the agricultural industry and land reclamation projects to increase food production – the growing of rice, barley, buckwheat, beans, ginseng, cotton and potatoes.

One famous international trade port during the Joseon era was Pyongnam, where medieval Korean merchants offered brocades, jewelries, ginseng, silk, and porcelain, which were renowned worldwide.

Goods such as agate, sugar cane, raw spices, sulfur, dried fish, porcelain, herbal medicine, satin, rice paddies, cloth, salt, copper, venison and buckskin were traded between the Taiwanese aborigines and the European colonial empires and the East Asian states.

A strict ban on Han Chinese immigration from the coastal cities of China was instituted by the Kingdom of Cheng and Taiwan was transformed into an autocratic system resulted a long period of economic stagnation as its prominence as a global trading post regressed.

The most significant economic development during this time period was Taiwan's exclusive trade with China, mainly merchants from Fujian and the establishment of irrigation systems and hydraulic engineering projects.

Exports included rice, sugar, jute, rattan, and camphor wood while goods such as cotton fabric, cloth, silk, paper, agricultural equipment, wine and porcelain were imported.

[89] To cope with Taiwan's natural disadvantages, Japan began investing in intensive research and development and established rural institutions to create new methods of agricultural cultivation such as modern irrigation systems, newer and improved breeds of plants and crops that resisted changes in weather patterns, diseases, and bugs.

[93] From 1937 on wards, Taiwan began to place a heavy emphasis on industrial manufacturing, primarily military supplies and equipment (including metal processing and refinery, machinery, weapons, airplanes, and automobiles), petroleum, chemicals, and pharmaceuticals.

[100] Furthermore, a 2012 report by The Economist noted that South Korea is expected to overtake Japan in terms of GDP per person at power purchasing parity by 2017, a feat already accomplished by Macau (2010), Taiwan (2010), Hong Kong (1997), and Singapore (1993).

The Meiji government also modernized its infrastructure by establishing railway and shipping lines, telegraph and telephone systems, shipyards, mines, and inaugurated a land reform program to prepare the country for further development.

Despite bubbles culminating with a series of stock and real estate market crashes, the post-war miracle had transformed the island archipelago into the industrialized nation with a thriving middle class that it is today.

Marred by poverty, malnutrition, and illiteracy, political chaos, and cultural discourse, South Korea's gross domestic product per capita in 1960 was $79,[120] lower than that of some sub-Saharan African countries.

[124][125] With a strong emphasis on the importance of innovation, raw intelligence and brainpower, benchmarking, economic competitiveness, and industriousness, propelled a war torn and impoverished South Korea into a country of efficient resource allocation and increasing value creation.

Transforming itself from a resource-poor peninsula to an advanced high technology powerhouse with a cutting-edge electronic, automobiles, shipbuilding, steel, and petrochemicals industry contributed to the country's robust and sustained economic growth for over 50 years.

[52] A number of factors such as contributed to China's stagnation behind Europe and Japan such as bureaucratic centralization that impeded innovation, creativity, and entrepreneurship, a sense of ethnic and cultural superiority, and preference of civilization continuity and resistance to modern change and technology.

[130] This growth enhanced China's market forces which made it simpler develop new cutting-edge technologies and introduce consumers to a wide variety of modern goods and services.

Additionally, the economy of Macau, then a Portuguese colony, was also experiencing rapid growth during this period through textile manufacturing and the development of a hospitality and tourism industry, which resulted in high levels of foreign direct investment into the territory.

[141] Among the major policy choices commonly adopted in East Asia, and noticeably less so elsewhere in the developing world are openness to foreign trade, significant levels of government savings and an emphasis on education for both boys and girls.