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I've seen your quality posts on Chinese manufacturing. I feel like you are strawmanning an argument surrounding interior development that I did not make. Indust

I've seen your quality posts on Chinese manufacturing. I feel like you are strawmanning an argument surrounding interior development that I did not make. Industrializing the interior provinces will not uplift 600M inland to parity with coast, I never claimed otherwise. The claim is that despite 600M able to work for less than ASEAN, it's still not sufficient regardless of whether industry can be recaptured inland. In this case, lost light industry for predominantly undereducated unskilled rural labourers, for which there is no labour shortage post planned agricultural reforms. The poor will mostly remain idle/informal. Whether the ship has sailed is ultimately secondary to the fact that the ship never had such capacity in the first place. Fully developing China simply was/is/will not be possible with so many people. Hence demographic decline, in China's case is a forgone necessity, and the massive disparity between the haves / haves nots is essential in managing the transition. The end of which will situate China to better deal with a variety of issues. The blessing is the stabilized end population post decline, though far away and difficult to manage is preferable to demographic curse and uniformly unrealizable dividends due to resource constraints. It's preferable to have an unequal society where 1/2 underclass takes care of 1/2 globally competitive class. It's about as optimal for tackling demographic decline as one could hope for given Chinese geopolitical constraints, which is real and requires actual response than hypotheticals of fully automated luxury algae eating Utopia. Meanwhile, there's going to be efforts to retain manufacturing and industrial capability in particularly strategic sectors and the inertia of demographics will generate enough new human capita to maintain relative competitiveness. Metrics / indicators in the last few years suggest China share of global manufactured exports is maintaining / increasing. Automation is not a panacea, it's part of the response for competitiveness in certain sectors. Stability maintenance of the people is easier than great powers competition. The people matter, but only so much, and as component of comprehensive national power. As for journey ending earlier than expected, no one expected Trump, but pivot against China happened under Hu, so friction and competition also not unanticipated. I'm less pessimistic on prognosis of domestic consumption. Savings rate is high, real estate is a bubble, capital flight and brain drain is real. All true. IMO there's unused levers for those, though [x] doubt dual circulation. That said, 600M poor are frankly so poor that taking care of them is trivial. 1000 rmb is... so little that 600M / 40% of the population is 7% of national GDP - they can be bought off. Alternate framing, 2 years of slow 5% Chinese growth means the economy has expanded enough to take care of these people with 40% income increase. Forever. Manufacturing won't save China, less people will, the sooner the better, preferably the poor. It's ugly. Hard times are ahead. I'm rooting for algae utopia, but not holding breath.

baybal2 6y ago
The strawmanning here is from your side. > Fully developing China simply was/is/will not be possible with so many people. Hence demographic decline, in China's case is a forgone necessity, and the massive disparity between the haves / haves nots is essential in managing the transition. The end of which will situate China to better deal with a variety of issues. I feel the same sense of resignation, and defeatism in these words as when a man on road to Chinese officialdom regurgitated that official line to me. 1. 600M of non-salvageable rural poor is a direct result of Beijing elites with attitude exactly like yours treating rural people as human garbage needing to be disposed off, walled off, and forgotten of. 2. Even if Beijing elites gave as tiny bit of concern as just building technical institutes for rural youth, and didn't perpetrate a nationwide policy of discrimination against them, China could've rode the manufacturing train for at least one more decade at full speed, and could've been incomparably more well off, possibly ahead of US economically by today already. The biggest curse of China as it is now is that elites in Beijing don't have to give a round fuck about developing the country further knowing that China's economy is destined to become world's biggest in their lifetimes, no matter the amount of abuse, and mismanagement. More than enough to buy a luxury apartment, and an annual supply of maotai for a few millions in politically engaged class.
- dirtyid 6y ago
  >Chinese officialdom regurgitated that official line to me. So why not give some credence to the point if its coming from a presumably subject matter expert? > even if Beijing elites gave as tiny bit of concern The issue is more complex than elites from ZhongNanHai not caring, after all, every official who climbs up has to go through shit tier postings before advancing and has every incentive to succeed. The fundamental issue is China is massive and difficult to manage, especially after misguided purgings of political equity. There is only so much attention and resources to go around. Otherwise wouldn't need five year plans to prioritize. Edward Luttwak roughly summarizes this phenomenon as Great State Autism, rulers of large countries have so much on their plate, yet attention of decision makers who are ultimately human can not scale linearly with population. It's harder modernizing a massive country where every segment of society must be developed. China is not a middle country with US protection umbrella where the population can coast through on a few key industries. Add on indigenous defense, space, nuclear programs and other geopolitical considerations and it's like comparing building regional franchise into a multinational compared to running a mom-and-pop shop that has sponsorship from rich family. An alternate reality where the entire country got commiserate growth is a world where China ran 20 years of 20-30% growth. That expectation is fantasy. > biggest curse of China as it is now This is very true. Hence, Xi, and actual believer seems like the most suitable person for the job. Central / western cities Chengdu, Chongqing, Wuhan, Chansha etc grew under him. Efforts to limit growth of large cities to spread development into smaller centres. Hukou reforms. So I take his focus on balanced interior growth more seriously - "pending focus on neglected interior development". It's one of the largest reasons I find his centralization of power justifiable. I didn't think elites gave a fuck under Hu, now they're forced to. But ultimately there's only so much that can be done given real life constraints. The possibility space is limited and all things considered the cards have been well played in the last 30 years. New constraints in the next 30 are going to be harder. > needing to be disposed off, walled off, and forgotten of I'm confused why you think "non-salvageable rural poor" is my position when I'm hoping they'd be put to good use while you (seem) to think high quality factory workers are exhausted and resign to the fact that nothing will be done. I want more to be done, and think more will be. Just less optimistic that much can be. A bunch of technical schools and good management isn't going to add demand for 600M well paying jobs. > I feel the same sense of resignation, and defeatism I am resigned to the fact that 1.4B cannot possibly be elevated to western living standards in their lifetime, but I am optimistic their lives will see steady improvements if only because the bar is so low in the first place. Rebalancing inequity and redirecting development so 1000rmb end up 2-3000rmb over the demographic decline cycle would go a long way in terms improving QoL. > rode the manufacturing train for at least one more decade at full speed Could you elaborate on why you think this is possible.

baybal2 6y ago

The strawmanning here is from your side. > Fully developing China simply was/is/will not be possible with so many people. Hence demographic decline, in China's case is a forgone necessity, and the massive disparity between the haves / haves nots is essential in managing the transition. The end of which will situate China to better deal with a variety of issues. I feel the same sense of resignation, and defeatism in these words as when a man on road to Chinese officialdom regurgitated that official line to me. 1. 600M of non-salvageable rural poor is a direct result of Beijing elites with attitude exactly like yours treating rural people as human garbage needing to be disposed off, walled off, and forgotten of. 2. Even if Beijing elites gave as tiny bit of concern as just building technical institutes for rural youth, and didn't perpetrate a nationwide policy of discrimination against them, China could've rode the manufacturing train for at least one more decade at full speed, and could've been incomparably more well off, possibly ahead of US economically by today already. The biggest curse of China as it is now is that elites in Beijing don't have to give a round fuck about developing the country further knowing that China's economy is destined to become world's biggest in their lifetimes, no matter the amount of abuse, and mismanagement. More than enough to buy a luxury apartment, and an annual supply of maotai for a few millions in politically engaged class.

dirtyid 6y ago
>Chinese officialdom regurgitated that official line to me. So why not give some credence to the point if its coming from a presumably subject matter expert? > even if Beijing elites gave as tiny bit of concern The issue is more complex than elites from ZhongNanHai not caring, after all, every official who climbs up has to go through shit tier postings before advancing and has every incentive to succeed. The fundamental issue is China is massive and difficult to manage, especially after misguided purgings of political equity. There is only so much attention and resources to go around. Otherwise wouldn't need five year plans to prioritize. Edward Luttwak roughly summarizes this phenomenon as Great State Autism, rulers of large countries have so much on their plate, yet attention of decision makers who are ultimately human can not scale linearly with population. It's harder modernizing a massive country where every segment of society must be developed. China is not a middle country with US protection umbrella where the population can coast through on a few key industries. Add on indigenous defense, space, nuclear programs and other geopolitical considerations and it's like comparing building regional franchise into a multinational compared to running a mom-and-pop shop that has sponsorship from rich family. An alternate reality where the entire country got commiserate growth is a world where China ran 20 years of 20-30% growth. That expectation is fantasy. > biggest curse of China as it is now This is very true. Hence, Xi, and actual believer seems like the most suitable person for the job. Central / western cities Chengdu, Chongqing, Wuhan, Chansha etc grew under him. Efforts to limit growth of large cities to spread development into smaller centres. Hukou reforms. So I take his focus on balanced interior growth more seriously - "pending focus on neglected interior development". It's one of the largest reasons I find his centralization of power justifiable. I didn't think elites gave a fuck under Hu, now they're forced to. But ultimately there's only so much that can be done given real life constraints. The possibility space is limited and all things considered the cards have been well played in the last 30 years. New constraints in the next 30 are going to be harder. > needing to be disposed off, walled off, and forgotten of I'm confused why you think "non-salvageable rural poor" is my position when I'm hoping they'd be put to good use while you (seem) to think high quality factory workers are exhausted and resign to the fact that nothing will be done. I want more to be done, and think more will be. Just less optimistic that much can be. A bunch of technical schools and good management isn't going to add demand for 600M well paying jobs. > I feel the same sense of resignation, and defeatism I am resigned to the fact that 1.4B cannot possibly be elevated to western living standards in their lifetime, but I am optimistic their lives will see steady improvements if only because the bar is so low in the first place. Rebalancing inequity and redirecting development so 1000rmb end up 2-3000rmb over the demographic decline cycle would go a long way in terms improving QoL. > rode the manufacturing train for at least one more decade at full speed Could you elaborate on why you think this is possible.