Miscellaneous News

[pmc]

Look no further than Ukraine, despite Russia having x2 their GDP per capita, before the war, they still auto-destructed themselves instead of even barely acknowledging Russian interests and identity in their country. That's what awaits Taiwan as well

. Taiwanese are much wealthy they have infrastructure and privileges of first world. and it is also reflected in there weopon systems.
Ukrainians look for work in Poland. and cities like Warsaw either lack urban planners or corruption. Cities need to have that look on top of infrastructure to make them appealing whether its historic building or new districts. The wealth gap between Russians and Ukrainians much higher once you are outside main cities. Putin has to drive around in 20 years old Toyota to blend in Mariupol. these people haven't seen development in life. but if he was in Sochi, Krasnodar, Anapa, Grozny, Nalchik or Ossetia. he could be in fleet of hundreds of sports cars and people will still appreciate it. No amount of statistics can capture this difference but those who interact at personal level they know it..

 

[broadsword]

No you are wrong.

1) Warren Buffet’s partner, Charlie Munger, is a well known Wumao.
2) All Wumaos get money from SeeSeePee.
3) If Berkshire Hathaway bails out the banks, it will use assets from Charlie Munger and his Chinese money. So China has essentially bailed out the banks.

I knew it was always a matter of time before you exercise your power of transitory property reasoning.

 

[Rast]

GDP in PPP matters very little to the perception of people in terms who is wealthy and who is not. Your 100 yuan may buy the same clothing as the $100 dollar dress you buy in the US, but the quality differences will be pronounced. you may get a high end western branded dress with $100 but not with 100 yuan.

GDP in PPP exists exactly because wealth and obtained value for spending is not a standardized value across a nation let alone the world.

Take military budgets for example:







If you made a simple adjustment based on exchange rates (second bar), the military budget of China, India, and Russia is dwarfed by the budget of the US. But if the budgets are corrected for the spread in the amount of value gained for how much is spent, the US budget is dwarfed by the PPP spending of China, India, and Russia.

The fact is Japanese, Americans, Hong Kongers earn much more than the Chinese, their income is simply bigger when they buy western branded goods which is what they consider world's best. Their income will allow them to go alot more places for tourism. And Most westerners probably have bigger houses, probably more than one car and better quality of life in terms of stuff they own.

Almost all of western branded clothing is made in China or other low cost countries. In China for example, the same factories turn out clothing for domestic consumption.

Again, GDP in PPP is used because a numerically higher average number does not equate to higher mobility or wealth or the impact from them.

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Vehicle ownership is a terrible measure of prosperity as it is influenced by the availability of public transportation, geographic characteristics, and governmental regulation. Either way, most westerners do not own more than one vehicle:

Europeans own

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Americans own

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Housing and quality of life is influenced by the same things as vehicle ownership with the addition of differing cultural norms, so I'll leave it at that.

Moreover, the kind of Jobs that Hong Kongers or Westerners do are what is considered as superior white collar jobs. They work as lawyers, managers, scientists, designers while most Chinese are factory workers. So, it is no wonder they consider themselves to be richer and superior in every way.

Now everyone knows you have never had a real job and are still in school. Factory work and skilled trades are well paid, more so than most 'white collar' jobs. But lets look at some data just for fun!

The EU seems to be afraid of separating data on higher education but total total tertiary education levels (vocational/associates degree to doctorates):

Percent of US total tertiary education:

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Percent of EU total tertiary education:

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.

Terms like white collar are too nebulous of categories for data comparison purposes. But most well paying white collar jobs are gated by a need to have at least a bachelors degree. If you look at the data:

Percent of US residents with at least a bachelors degree : 23.5%

*EU rates should be similar

High achievement and therefore actually higher earning careers like scientists, doctors, managers, etc usually require at least a masters degree or equivalent:

Percent of US residents with at least a masters to doctorate: 14.3%


In total that is only 37.8% with a bachelors degree or higher. So, now we all know that most westerners are not meaningfully 'white collar' nor are they high earners.

Ofcourse, these things are changing slowly, China is getting better, but perception always lags behind actual situation. For China to be seen as equal to the west. They will have to be not only as equally rich in nominal terms, but also produce brands that are equal or superior to western brands.

According to western funded research, China is already the leader in

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. More meaningful to me is that 67% of the high-impact authors of research papers trained in Chinese Universities and work in China.

Brand perception is the result of marketing, it is ultimately meaningless as values among people and over time is not constant. In terms of manufacturing the high end products, that is already being done in China for the rest of the world. Your about a decade late in your understanding of manufacturing.

 

[Breadbox]

GDP in PPP matters very little to the perception of people in terms who is wealthy and who is not. Your 100 yuan may buy the same clothing as the $100 dollar dress you buy in the US, but the quality differences will be pronounced. you may get a high end western branded dress with $100 but not with 100 yuan.

Hilarious, let me stop you right because this cannot be further from the truth, brand recognition and marketing are basically what most of these 'western' brands have left.

If you honestly think any of those luxury brand's exorbitant prices have anything to do with 'quality', then you are just hopelessly out of touch. They exists solely for the rich to flex on middle class and the poor, the end.

 

[Breadbox]

Intrigued when this CGTN news anchor seemingly implied that 9/11 could also have been an inside job (she compares the Nord stream bombing to it and Hersh is completely surprised). Didn't know this particular view was prominent in the establishment.

Hopefully it's not, an advantage China has over the US is its ability to objectively assess claims. When the US saw some morons raving about random BS in China, it immediately assume it must be true because it wants it to be true to push an agenda.
China should do well to be skeptical of the den of coked up clowns in the United States, be it the Truthers, Qanoners or what ever bizarre cults that spawned from the dark recesses of that country.

 

[sunnymaxi]

Europe simple do not have the productive capacity for high intensity warfare. This isn’t even a money problem. Its a problem of physical production constraints that will be exacerbated by the energy crisis...

 

[siegecrossbow]

Europe simple do not have the productive capacity for high intensity warfare. This isn’t even a money problem. Its a problem of physical production constraints that will be exacerbated by the energy crisis...

They can work around it by paying China to do it and slap a made in EU sticker on.

 

[BoraTas]

You guys are wasting your time. Dunno why everyone pays so much attention to what Wanwan thinks of China. So much useless soft power crap talk

You must have all missed the August Chinese military exercises which made Wanwanese pee in the pants. The only thing that matters is hard power. Drill that into your heads and you will finally understand how the real world works.

And btw Wanwan is irrelevant here. This is a US-China hegemonic clash, and the victor out of this clash will determine Wanwan's fate. Wanwanese have as much control of their foreign policy as Ukrainian citizens

My opinion towards this has changed in the past months. Being unlikeable and/or lacking means of tacit influence (NGOs, lobbys, etc...) has consequences. A problem China faces is most of the young Taiwanese don't identify as Chinese at any level. That is unique. Ask people of Chinese ethnicity everywhere. Even liberal types would declare they are ethnically Chinese. The current Taiwanese youth don't consider themselves Chinese even ethnically. We even have types who claim they are Japanese or Dutch, which we make fun of here and would enrage many mainlanders if the Chinese media was showing it. This has two implications:

1- Peaceful reunification is impossible. Anyone who says it will be possible by 20XX doesn't know what's going on in Taiwan. Taiwan was more Chinese when China was poorer. Modern Taiwan is literally suffering from a net brain drain to the mainland yet we don't see any reflections of that reality in politics.

2- All of this was a project by the USA and the pro-independence elite. But nowadays it is self-sustaining. Just look at the aftermath of the Ma-Xi meeting in 2015. Taiwan is becoming harder to integrate not easier. This is why I think China needs to do this before 2035 and ideally before 2030. Otherwise, it will have its own Donbas. China can suppress separatism, but why do it when you can avoid the problem altogether?

All of this de-sinicization of Taiwan would be much slower if Chinese cultural exports were stronger.

Another two examples. Yes, Australia and Japan. These countries are almost vassals by pre-1950s definition. Yet they, like all other countries, have to justify government expenses to the public. If China's cultural exports were strong, a lot more people would be weirded out by the notion of the Chinese threat. So their governments wouldn't be able to increase military spending and activity this easily. That would be a net positive for China in WESTPAC. So yes, animated films or dancing girls can have a real impact on the military balance in a region.

As I said in other threads, China has achieved incredible success in growing its economy and military. But it refrains from a few activities and lacks a few skills that prevent it from organizing a strong systemic pushback against US influence. The lack of a strong cultural exports industry (in 2023 this is mostly entertainment media) is one of those lacking things. Genshin Impact probably recruited more Wumaos than all CGTN footage since its founding combined LOL. Denying the existence of the problem would only make it permanent.

 

[siegecrossbow]

My opinion towards this has changed in the past months. Being unlikeable and/or lacking means of tacit influence (NGOs, lobbys, etc...) has consequences. A problem China faces is most of the young Taiwanese don't identify as Chinese at any level. That is unique. Ask people of Chinese ethnicity everywhere. Even liberal types would declare they are ethnically Chinese. The current Taiwanese youth don't consider themselves Chinese even ethnically. We even have types who claim they are Japanese or Dutch, which we make fun of here and would enrage many mainlanders if the Chinese media was showing it. This has two implications:

1- Peaceful reunification is impossible. Anyone who says it will be possible by 20XX doesn't know what's going on in Taiwan. Taiwan was more Chinese when China was poorer. Modern Taiwan is literally suffering from a net brain drain to the mainland yet we don't see any reflections of that reality in politics.

2- All of this was a project by the USA and the pro-independence elite. But nowadays it is self-sustaining. Just look at the aftermath of the Ma-Xi meeting in 2015. Taiwan is becoming harder to integrate not easier. This is why I think China needs to do this before 2035 and ideally before 2030. Otherwise, it will have its own Donbas. China can suppress separatism, but why do it when you can avoid the problem altogether?

All of this de-sinicization of Taiwan would be much slower if Chinese cultural exports were stronger.

Another two examples. Yes, Australia and Japan. These countries are almost vassals by pre-1950s definition. Yet they, like all other countries, have to justify government expenses to the public. If China's cultural exports were strong, a lot more people would be weirded out by the notion of the Chinese threat. So their governments wouldn't be able to increase military spending and activity this easily. That would be a net positive for China in WESTPAC. So yes, animated films or dancing girls can have a real impact on the military balance in a region.

As I said in other threads, China has achieved incredible success in growing its economy and military. But it refrains from a few activities and lacks a few skills that prevent it from organizing a strong systemic pushback against US influence. The lack of a strong cultural exports industry (in 2023 this is mostly entertainment media) is one of those lacking things. Genshin Impact probably recruited more Wumaos than all CGTN footage since its founding combined LOL. Denying the existence of the problem would only make it permanent.

It is easier said than done though. Japanese culture exports are successful not only because they offer strong products, but also that such exports are tolerated by the U.S. How could China export any cultural products when something as innocuous Tiktok, which is devoid of any Chinese cultural content, is at risk of being banned? I think that’s an even bigger hurdle than creating competitive soft power products.

 

[BoraTas]

It is easier said than done though. Japanese culture exports are successful not only because they offer strong products, but also that such exports are tolerated by the U.S. How could China export any cultural products when something as innocuous Tiktok, which is devoid of any Chinese cultural content, is at risk of being banned? I think that’s an even bigger hurdle than creating competitive soft power products.

I agree. The US govt and the inherent sinophobia of English-language medium are impediments. But these alone can't be inhibiting. After all Genshin Impact and TikTok aren't banned yet. And Chinese cultural products still find a lot of markets. Look at Wandering Earth 2 for example. A lot of people watched it. There are many other problems. It will be a lib argument but yes, excessive censorship is a problem. Political censorship is normal. But things like green blood and arbitrary bans on gaming are ridiculous. Just read Chinese software engineers' posts on social media. Most will tell you how the government effectively killed single player game industry in the early 2000s. Tencent and similars didn't focus on cheap mobile games for no reason.