Chinese Economics Thread

OppositeDay

Senior Member
Registered Member
That’s not true. In the U.S. Austin and Seattle are also major tech centers. However I agree that it is best for tech centers to form organically instead of through governmental intervention. If the soil is there, the efforts will bear fruit naturally.

What sets Xiongan apart from existing Chinese tech centers is its real estate policy. Forms of public housing are going to play the dominant role there. I don't think they've released any detailed plan yet but the goal is to make housing available for everyone working there.

The biggest economic injustice in China in the last 20 years was the real estate model. Investments from the government and businesses and the workers' hard work improved land value tremendously, but the value went to the pocket of the existing real estate owners. If you bought an apartment in Shenzhen 15 years ago your investments would have a 20 fold return even though you made no contribution to the city. Some young people working in Shenzhen is going to spend 20 years of his/her time working for you. This could be partially solved with a capital gains tax but the vested interest has proven too powerful so far.

Xiongan is a greenfield experiment on a new model of urban development. If successful this could lead a drop of real estate prices in Beijing as companies and work oppotunities move to Xiongan with its cheaper real estate costs.

I remember there are huge swamps of undeveloped land in Pudong, Shanghai as well.
 

OppositeDay

Senior Member
Registered Member
Land of Northeastern China is suited for large-scale mechanized farming. If the Northeast is allowed to de-industrialize we'll see a huge drop in population there. Remember it's an open secret that South Korea harbors territorial ambition for Northeastern China. Indeed, the well-known North Korea expert Andrei Lankov (who've taught in South Korea for 15+ years) once openly scolded the South Koreans for their absurd claim on Northeastern China and cited it as a major obstacle to Chinese support for Korean reunification.
 
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weig2000

Captain
Northeastern China's current problem is mostly a rust belt problem, similar to that of the US Midwest. It's not for lack of government support, not because of people there are lazy or officials there corrupt, as many asserted. They might all be true to some degree, but those were symptoms, not root cause.

Northeastern China, or Manchuria, historically had been China's most industrialized, most urbanized, with densest railway network until just over two decades ago. It's now burdened with many legacy heavy industries, lots of retirees, and shortage of young people due to outflow to the more dynamic areas of the country. It's become a vicious cycle. What's interesting though, is that Northeast China has become the largest and most productive crop growing region because of the scale and mechanization of farming.

Xiongan is more of Xi's project, much like what Shenzhen was to Deng and Shanghai Pudong to Jiang. The government has been keeping mum about what it is doing in Xiongan. It is meant to be experimental in nature similar to Shenzhen and Pudong initially, to blaze a trail for the China in the new era, for example, with emphasis of environment-friendly development etc. They are very cautious, and have been trying to involve a lot of experts in different fields. These experts need to sign NDA.

I have my share of doubts about the project and ambition, if you compare it with Shenzhen and Pudong.
 

Hendrik_2000

Lieutenant General
Im not chinese and i have never been to china, but what i have learned from school days (about 1990), is that north and NE china is where the old post-revolution industrial centers of china were located. With the opening up of the economy and globalization, its not a surprise that those regions became rust-belt regions, unable to adapt to the new economic realities, just like what happened with the US rust-belt regions.

I dont think that this has to do with government neglect.

Well you have to go back to the opening of China in 1980's Shenzen and Zhuhai along with Xiamen and Zhousan were selected to be the guinea pig of economic experimentation called SEZ(special economic zone) because of the location close to the financial center of Hongkong to attract investment from Hongkong . The same with Xiamen to attract investment from Taiwan and overseas Chinese from SEA. They started with pot and pan industry, textile, toy, plastic flower.Then in 2000 morph into small appliances, phone swtiching, electronic assembly etc Thing going so well it attract more investment now from the rest of the world. Then the best and brightest of China start to move to the south to found companies The rest is history. Also so far away from political center so the bold experiment in economy like private ownership of company won't cause ruffles in conservative north If it fail then they can sort it out.

So it is more by design than organic growth. The experiment were succesfull because the south is where traditionally more energetic, risk taker,daring, and enterpreuneurship than the north.less encumbered by bureaucratic red tape. Gene too play a role century of merchant immigration from the north imbue enterpreuneur spirit. Climate too play a role since the south is more temperate so you can build factory all year round Port too are ice free.

But actually the north should be the hot bed of Chinese invention since the best universities in China are in the north, Beida, Tsinghua, Nankai, North west universities, Add to that now most of the venture capitalist are in the north. All that missing is enterpreuneur spirit which they have now. So it is about time they form new economic center in the north to become hot bed of new industry
 
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sndef888

Senior Member
Registered Member
To be honest I don't know how Xiongan is going to succeed. It doesn't have nearly as good of a location as either Shenzhen or Shanghai. It's kind of in the middle of nowhere.

Sure, they could make a new city, but it would just be like any other city like Baoding or Shijiazhuang
 
Xiongan is a new Special Economic Zone. Will help establish a Silicon valley there since it's close to Beijing and the new govt offices.

I think they will make it suburby, very "green"



I like the idea. There needs to be more sustainable middle size cities with emphasis on quality of life. This will also relieve the burden on the few mega-cities nearby. It will be worth it even if even mildly successful.
 

Gatekeeper

Brigadier
Registered Member
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Remember the thaad debacle couple years back apparently the koreans still suffered the economic damage, the la times wrote an article about it, and they phrase it as if it was China fault for ruining jeju island tourism and ordinary koreans trade with China and that the us had nothing to do with it lol
One of these days they will realize that their alliance with the us is a liability rather than asset
And by the way the australians is going to get the same exact same treatment as south koreans

You do realised for the two Asian countries, this "alliance" is less than equitable. If any one think it is a partnership of two equals. They are living on another planet.

Peace will come to the Korean peninsula when a certain actor leave the area. As for the other Asian/US "partnership". I could care less if they remained a vassal state for another century.
 
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