Chinese Economics Thread

Petrolicious88

Senior Member
Registered Member
The "Western" model is why the US is a failure in handling coronavirus. Yeah if everyone followed the US model, it would look like the US was number one in handling outbreaks like they brag because everyone else would be failing also. That's the whole point. It's not about what's best. It's about the US being in control. If everyone follows the Western model, everyone has to look up to the West assuring their control over everything. Again look at EmDrives. Western scientists rejected it because it simply defied the laws of Newton. The Chinese aren't bound to Western schools of thought and tried it out and found there was something to it. If China never looked at it, Western scientists would not be looking at it now. Look at stem cell research. Because of Christians beliefs Western countries are not allowed to research it. China does to Western disdain. Yet you have arch-conservative Republican actor Chuck Norris where his wife had some botched surgery in the US who was rich enough to have the stem-cell surgery in China needed to treat the aftermath. Following the Western model means blindly obeying the West. How about everyone pick and chooses from others including the West what works for them which is what China is doing now? Nope! They demand everything be done like how the West does it. Why? It's not because it's the best. It's because they want to be in control.

That's the problem with China. If the US sees China failing at something, they'll let you know forever... When the US is a failure China doesn't tell that to the US. China is guilty like everyone else in the world not saying anything so Americans can continue to think they're always right and because of that, Americans think they get to dictate to everyone because they're always right hence why they think they can criticize China. I bring up the guy that abuses his wife or girlfriend analogy how the guy says his abuse is all about love and if he didn't love her he wouldn't be abusing her. He always tells her she can do nothing without him so that brainwashes her into staying in the abusive relationship because it's all really about keeping her under his control so she not dare try to leave him. China isn't the one describing Sino-US relations as a marriage talking about divorcing and decoupling... They're the ones saying China can't do anything without them. They say they don't need China yet still trying to get China to submit. For China's own good...? Or is because the US needs to control everything...? If China goes it's own way, that might give other countries ideas. That's why they can never leave China alone.
Not saying China should just blindly follow the western model. I think everyone here can agree to that.
But to succeed in the next stages of development and actually innovate, and also compete head to head with the best from the West, China needs to continue to reform. The key is what exactly needs to be done and the time frame it needs to be done at.
 

AssassinsMace

Lieutenant General
Not saying China should just blindly follow the western model. I think everyone here can agree to that.
But to succeed in the next stages of development and actually innovate, and also compete head to head with the best from the West, China needs to continue to reform. The key is what exactly needs to be done and the time frame it needs to be done at.

I have no problem with reform just as long as the US or any of its subordinates is not the one who get to dictate it. That's the part they don't tell you is reform is by Western standards meaning you have to do what the West tells you...
 

AndrewS

Brigadier
Registered Member
Question for the experts:

what are the ways China is implementing to reform the structural problems within the economy. I.e huge local govt debt, housing bubble, demographic changes , etc...

What is China doing to achieve the goal of transition from a middle income to a high income economy. Is China at least moving in the right direction?

Note that Japan has the same issues with "huge local govt debt, housing bubble, demographic changes , etc".
But Japan still made it to a high-income, high tech society.

Old post below on the correlation between R&D Spending and high-income status with reference to China.


Again, such a fleet would still mean the PLAN would be accepting a fleet size significantly inferior to the US Navy.

I think the major point of disagreement is how large the Chinese economy will be in the future. So I'll summarise my reasoning below.

The key indicator for me is R&D spending.

20 years ago, China was a low-income country but still sustained R&D spending of 1% of GDP. That is at the top end for even a middle-income country.

But now China is a middle-income country, and Chinese R&D spending has steadily grown to 2.2%. And we only see wealthy hi-tech countries sustain anything over 2%. And it doesn't matter whether R&D spending is a cause or an effect of economic growth. What matters is that we can make certain empirical correlations.

If China is falling into the middle trap with slow or stagnant growth, we should see R&D spending crashing down to half of what it is today.

But we actually see R&D spending growth accelerating in China, and the National Science Foundation is already saying China is spending more on R&D than the US this year. Note the vast majority of Chinese spending is conducted by private companies, using a Chinese cost base, seeking profit in the world's largest market for most categories of goods and services.

So this will drive technological upgrading and productivity improvements, and is why I expect relatively fast growth of 5-6%. That would be consistent with the estimates from the Australian Defense and Foreign Affairs departments, which are planning for a world where the Chinese economy grows to twice the size of the US in PPP terms by 2030-2035. That is from 30% larger today.

And in the long run, we can expect China's currency to appreciate to match the PPP exchange rate.

---

But let's say for argument that the Chinese economy does stagnate with only 3-4% growth. That means Chinese GDP in PPP terms only grows from 30% larger today to 50% larger in 2030-2035.

That would still allow China to comfortably field the equivalent of a US navy.

And remember that PPP is a better measure of military spending/capabilities than the exchange rate, given:
1. The vast majority of Chinese military spending is incurred domestically with a Chinese cost base. So imports and the cost of raw materials aren't significant.
2. The difference in costs that we see between the US and Chinese/Russian ships. That applies to both the civilian and military ship costs, where they are known.

On the requirements side, China's major territorial challenges are at sea - in the SCS, ECS and Taiwan.
Plus China is the world's largest trading nation and depends on seaborne imports for raw materials, as well as for exports of manufactured goods.

So the military, government, business and the general population are all in agreement that a large navy is required.
Hence my view that the Chinese Navy will seek a minimum of parity with the US Navy.

Plus can you ever imagine China settling for anything less than being an equal to the US?
 

KenC

Junior Member
Registered Member
The West has a habit in nitpicking and overly dramatize China's apparent problem, while ignoring their own much bigger issues at home.
The local debt , housing debt and demographics changes are case in point. The newest additions are the Covid19 in Beijing and Three Gorges dam (which is not a problem to begin with) .
The fact is that Chinese government has the capability and ability to reform and address any problems that appear. In fact it is more forward looking than any other governments out there in the West.
 

Petrolicious88

Senior Member
Registered Member
I have no problem with reform just as long as the US or any of its subordinates is not the one who get to dictate it. That's the part they don't tell you is reform is by Western standards meaning you have to do what the West tells you...

Reform is painful, but will eventually unleash the power of each individual Chinese citizens. If the west doesn’t pressure China, it may never reform. That pressure is useful.
 

Rettam Stacf

Junior Member
Registered Member
Reform is painful, but will eventually unleash the power of each individual Chinese citizens. If the west doesn’t pressure China, it may never reform. That pressure is useful.

Petrolicious88, you come across as you are advocating China should reform in those areas that the West told China to, and not what China should do based on what she thinks is right for the country. Your "West knows Best" mentality is what turns off people like AssasinsMace who know from closely observing China over a long period of time that China's selected path, while not perfect, worked very well so far for China, and has results to show for it.
 

SoupDumplings

Junior Member
Registered Member
Petrolicious88, you come across as you are advocating China should reform in those areas that the West told China to, and not what China should do based on what she thinks is right for the country. Your "West knows Best" mentality is what turns off people like AssasinsMace who know from closely observing China over a long period of time that China's selected path, while not perfect, worked very well so far for China, and has results to show for it.
I think what he/she means is that when politicians or countries don't face threats (internal and external), they get lazy, and degrade their institutions. Just look at how deluded the US had become since the USSR fell. With China's massive SOEs and reliance on guanxi, there are bound to be many princlings and politicians that prefer the status quo in order to get rich rather than reform to make the country stronger. This would hold back China's reform. An external threat like the US would provide the incentive to push through painful but important reforms. It would be terrible if China's politicans end up like those in the US with their heads in the clouds.

An easy example I can think of is Zhu RongJi's reform of the SOEs in the early 2000s that laid off millions of workers, but now after 2 decades have made China's SOEs much more innovative, efficient and profitable. And there are probably more examples out there.
 

AssassinsMace

Lieutenant General
Reform is painful, but will eventually unleash the power of each individual Chinese citizens. If the west doesn’t pressure China, it may never reform. That pressure is useful.

You may trust Western governments. I don't. I was born in the US. By American logic they think they're an expert on China because they had a vacation there or they took a class in school or they dated an Asian... By those prerequisites I am the expert on them. Obama said that China would never be an innovative country because it lacked political freedom. China is exploding with innovation today that has the West alarmed over Made in China 2025. Why would they be alarmed when they were giving the secrets to innovation to China? It's because political freedom has nothing to do with innovation. It was a trick they wanted to pull on China into reforming politically so they can manipulate Chinese just like how social media companies are accused of evil influence across the Western world undermining democracy and what they accuse other countries of doing to them. If China is exploding with innovation, it means China has more freedom than the West is saying or you don't need political freedom to be innovated. Either case it was a lie and manipulation. If it were so good for China, why would they have lie and connect innovation with political freedom. Hugo Chavez was elected in a democratic vote yet the West rejected it. So why did the West reject a democratic vote. Was it because the government that a democracy voted for wasn't pro-West? Democratic values is not the most important. Being a subordinate to the West is. Does China want reforms to be just like the US in handling coronavirus? China certainly would've had more deaths but never mind because democratic principles are that more important. And if they cared about their democratic principles, they would've accepted Hugo Chavez as leader of Venezuela warts and all. No but instead they were hypocrites. Everyone hates a hypocrite even other hypocrites hate other hypocrites because they know what a hypocrite is motivated by their own selfishness and no one else's interests. Hence why I don't trust them.

The Europeans could've ganged-up the world to confront Trump and that would've stopped him. They don't like Trump yet they did nothing of the sort because they agree with his goals just not the method. Even with Trump as President, they still side with the US. Trump's campaign against Made in China 2025 started with Obama and the EU agreed with him. They said back then there were afraid China domestically producing key technologies would mean China wouldn't be buying it from them. Well first they had laws preventing them from selling most of those technologies to China but they still wanted China not to make it on their own. There was an article in the National Review charging how low China is at when in a poll "nice to everyone" Canada mostly hate China. That's a Western propaganda narrative that Canada is so nice and polite to everyone. Read their history on how they treated minorities and some of their acts were individually worse and more cruel than what happened in the US. It's just in the US more in numbers eclipsed the extraordinary individual cruelty Canadians inflicted. Am I going to trust Canadians who have the reputation of being environment conscience when they ship over half their garbage overseas to lesser developed countries? Any country can make themselves look clean when you ship your garbage to another country that can be taken advantage of. Where's their morally superior conscience now?

It's all these things on why they say we're supposed to trust them blindly on when it's all a lie...
 

SPOOPYSKELETON

Junior Member
Registered Member
Why is anyone taking Western advice seriously? Capitalist bullshit has thoroughly destroyed America's social fabric, there is need to imitate that.

There is no point in China doing "Liberalism 2.0", instead we should try to create something new, a better form of economic organization for the new century.
 
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