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Should the goal of the US be to emulate happy, stable, wealthy, smaller economies but arguably more egalitarian northern European democracies? Or rather, shoul

Should the goal of the US be to emulate happy, stable, wealthy, smaller economies but arguably more egalitarian northern European democracies? Or rather, should we chase China in a race to the bottom? Lower corporate taxes, longer working hours, reduced environmental protections, with the goal of creating a fabulously wealthy klepto-capitalist ruling class? How dare people criticize kids burning the candle at both ends to make other people billions of dollars, China is beating us!

drzaiusapelord 12y ago
You can't have endless impressive growth. Once you're developed its going to hit a reasonable cap. China is still developing. You can't compare the most mature economy to one of least developed. The move from back-breaking farm labor all day to manufacturing is MASSIVE growth. The problem with Western democracies is that we moved past that stage over 100 years ago. Now we're in a service based economy. That just doesn't have that wonderful growth curve. As many democratic and liberal nations have discovered, its a fool's errand to chase growth on that curve and, as you said, the wealth and stability of north Europe is a tempting target to emulate. With recent moves towards proper socialization like Obamacare and focusing on tax cuts for the middle class and raising the minimum wage, I feel like we're on the path to those economies and have long stepped off the path of just beating down workers for tiny gains as we fight the laws of diminishing returns. How much workers unrest does the CCP violently take down per year to keep people in line? How many secret police arrests? These pro-China pieces are mystifying to me. Geeks always seem to worship autocrats and dictators for whatever reason. I guess they like the idea of a centralized control by elites, but that simply doesn't scale well and it invites corruption and other inefficiencies much faster than a more open political process. I'd rather live in the poorest Western nation than in China or Russia. Its crazy that we're actually seeing their system as superior to ours. Only on HN would this drivel be voted so highly. INTJ social and moral blindness is in full effect here. I look forward to the scandinaviation of all things. I believe its the best path humanity has.
- hencq 12y ago
  Completely agreed. Most of China's growth has been from moving people from agriculture to manufacturing. Essentially activating its giant labor force to compete on price. This has lifted millions of people out of poverty. However, it's still not entirely clear if China will be able to avoid the middle income trap that many countries seem to get stuck in as labor becomes more expensive and they aren't able to compete on price anymore.
- secstate 12y ago
  Excellent points. I live in a community with a fair few retired state officials, and the China fear/admiration is also entrenched amongst folks who are already very wealthy, and have a passing interest in staying on top of international politics. There is something to your observation of wealthy individuals of medium to high intellect falling in love with autocrats, as though if a few smarter people could just control a little more, things would be better/more optimized/grow faster. The twist of course being the punchline to Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. What is better? Why optimize? Growth for what purpose?
- smacktoward 12y ago
  > These pro-China pieces are mystifying to me. Geeks always seem to worship autocrats and dictators for whatever reason. It's because we see the world through the lens of our relationship with our computers, and in that relationship, we are dictators. We tell the computer what to do, and it just does it. It never asks for more vacation time or complains when we push it to its physical limits. In those cases where it doesn't do what we told it, 99% of the time the reason is because we phrased the request wrong. Then we look at democracy and start thinking, man, how inefficient all this taking into account other peoples' needs and principles and desires is! When you start thinking of the world as a computer, it's not a giant leap to think that the solution to all its problems is just to give someone out there root privileges.
  - TeMPOraL 12y ago
    I disagree. I think it's mostly because geeks like effective solutions. Dictatorships, despite all their scary failure modes, have one very good feature democracies lack - they get things done. When there's a new power plant to be built or transportation project to be realized, they just happen. There's no need to pander to clueless people bitching about things they don't understand. No anti-nuclear movements, no NIMBYsm, etc. No decision-making overheads because various politicians are bribed to support different groups. No pandering to electorate. If it needs to be done, it just gets done. In contrast, western governments are pretty much incapable of any serious action on anything that matters. I think this is the very reason geeks seem to worship benevolent dictatorships. They're just efficient. It's maintaining the benevolent part that is hard.
kyllo 12y ago
I wish I could upvote this more than once. American insecurities about China seem to come from people who don't understand how unenviable China's position is. The country is authoritarian, polluted, crowded, and corrupt. People in China work hard because living in China really, really sucks if you are poor. Members of the wealthy ruling class all own property overseas and send their kids to university overseas. They made their money from owning manufacturing companies that sell goods to American brands. There isn't much of a middle class because white-collar jobs in China are so limited and pay so poorly because so many college graduates are competing for them. There is literally nothing about China's economic system that would be appropriate for the US to try to emulate. We need to look to Northern Europe if we're looking for an example to model our system after.
- cyorir 12y ago
  I think you are hitting the right point, that China's system has a lot of flaws that we don't want to pick up. However, you are casting this in absolutist terms, "NOTHING about China's economic system would be appropriate," and I do not think that is correct either. Just because China has some flaws, such as its inability to handle environmental and social problems, it is a fallacy to then say that every thing about it is flawed. I think a more reasonable response is to say, "we should look to Northern Europe, but we should also look to China, and be wary of making the same mistakes found in any given system, whether in China or in Northern Europe."
  - kyllo 12y ago
    Lately I have been trying to avoid using weasel words. I'd rather err on the side of painting with too broad a brush than weaken my statements with a bunch of qualifiers that add no meaning. Having said that, I really can't think of one aspect of China's economic system that would be appropriate for the US to emulate. We're envious of their growth rate and insecure that their GDP will surpass ours, but that doesn't mean any of their actual policies are appropriate for the US economy.
cryoshon 12y ago
We've already chosen the race to the bottom, friend. The Chinese have a head start, but don't worry, we're following as closely as we can manage and as our nation-specific bonus we already have the klepto-capitalist class in place.
- 3pt14159 12y ago
  Oh please. The US public spending as a percent of GDP is around Canada's: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Government_spending http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Government_spending And almost double Chinas. Even after you take out the military there is no basis in saying that the US has raced to the bottom.

drzaiusapelord 12y ago

You can't have endless impressive growth. Once you're developed its going to hit a reasonable cap. China is still developing. You can't compare the most mature economy to one of least developed. The move from back-breaking farm labor all day to manufacturing is MASSIVE growth. The problem with Western democracies is that we moved past that stage over 100 years ago. Now we're in a service based economy. That just doesn't have that wonderful growth curve. As many democratic and liberal nations have discovered, its a fool's errand to chase growth on that curve and, as you said, the wealth and stability of north Europe is a tempting target to emulate. With recent moves towards proper socialization like Obamacare and focusing on tax cuts for the middle class and raising the minimum wage, I feel like we're on the path to those economies and have long stepped off the path of just beating down workers for tiny gains as we fight the laws of diminishing returns. How much workers unrest does the CCP violently take down per year to keep people in line? How many secret police arrests? These pro-China pieces are mystifying to me. Geeks always seem to worship autocrats and dictators for whatever reason. I guess they like the idea of a centralized control by elites, but that simply doesn't scale well and it invites corruption and other inefficiencies much faster than a more open political process. I'd rather live in the poorest Western nation than in China or Russia. Its crazy that we're actually seeing their system as superior to ours. Only on HN would this drivel be voted so highly. INTJ social and moral blindness is in full effect here. I look forward to the scandinaviation of all things. I believe its the best path humanity has.

hencq 12y ago
Completely agreed. Most of China's growth has been from moving people from agriculture to manufacturing. Essentially activating its giant labor force to compete on price. This has lifted millions of people out of poverty. However, it's still not entirely clear if China will be able to avoid the middle income trap that many countries seem to get stuck in as labor becomes more expensive and they aren't able to compete on price anymore.
secstate 12y ago
Excellent points. I live in a community with a fair few retired state officials, and the China fear/admiration is also entrenched amongst folks who are already very wealthy, and have a passing interest in staying on top of international politics. There is something to your observation of wealthy individuals of medium to high intellect falling in love with autocrats, as though if a few smarter people could just control a little more, things would be better/more optimized/grow faster. The twist of course being the punchline to Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. What is better? Why optimize? Growth for what purpose?
smacktoward 12y ago
> These pro-China pieces are mystifying to me. Geeks always seem to worship autocrats and dictators for whatever reason. It's because we see the world through the lens of our relationship with our computers, and in that relationship, we are dictators. We tell the computer what to do, and it just does it. It never asks for more vacation time or complains when we push it to its physical limits. In those cases where it doesn't do what we told it, 99% of the time the reason is because we phrased the request wrong. Then we look at democracy and start thinking, man, how inefficient all this taking into account other peoples' needs and principles and desires is! When you start thinking of the world as a computer, it's not a giant leap to think that the solution to all its problems is just to give someone out there root privileges.
- TeMPOraL 12y ago
  I disagree. I think it's mostly because geeks like effective solutions. Dictatorships, despite all their scary failure modes, have one very good feature democracies lack - they get things done. When there's a new power plant to be built or transportation project to be realized, they just happen. There's no need to pander to clueless people bitching about things they don't understand. No anti-nuclear movements, no NIMBYsm, etc. No decision-making overheads because various politicians are bribed to support different groups. No pandering to electorate. If it needs to be done, it just gets done. In contrast, western governments are pretty much incapable of any serious action on anything that matters. I think this is the very reason geeks seem to worship benevolent dictatorships. They're just efficient. It's maintaining the benevolent part that is hard.

kyllo 12y ago

I wish I could upvote this more than once. American insecurities about China seem to come from people who don't understand how unenviable China's position is. The country is authoritarian, polluted, crowded, and corrupt. People in China work hard because living in China really, really sucks if you are poor. Members of the wealthy ruling class all own property overseas and send their kids to university overseas. They made their money from owning manufacturing companies that sell goods to American brands. There isn't much of a middle class because white-collar jobs in China are so limited and pay so poorly because so many college graduates are competing for them. There is literally nothing about China's economic system that would be appropriate for the US to try to emulate. We need to look to Northern Europe if we're looking for an example to model our system after.

cyorir 12y ago
I think you are hitting the right point, that China's system has a lot of flaws that we don't want to pick up. However, you are casting this in absolutist terms, "NOTHING about China's economic system would be appropriate," and I do not think that is correct either. Just because China has some flaws, such as its inability to handle environmental and social problems, it is a fallacy to then say that every thing about it is flawed. I think a more reasonable response is to say, "we should look to Northern Europe, but we should also look to China, and be wary of making the same mistakes found in any given system, whether in China or in Northern Europe."
- kyllo 12y ago
  Lately I have been trying to avoid using weasel words. I'd rather err on the side of painting with too broad a brush than weaken my statements with a bunch of qualifiers that add no meaning. Having said that, I really can't think of one aspect of China's economic system that would be appropriate for the US to emulate. We're envious of their growth rate and insecure that their GDP will surpass ours, but that doesn't mean any of their actual policies are appropriate for the US economy.

cryoshon 12y ago

We've already chosen the race to the bottom, friend. The Chinese have a head start, but don't worry, we're following as closely as we can manage and as our nation-specific bonus we already have the klepto-capitalist class in place.

3pt14159 12y ago
Oh please. The US public spending as a percent of GDP is around Canada's: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Government_spending http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Government_spending And almost double Chinas. Even after you take out the military there is no basis in saying that the US has raced to the bottom.