the unspoken (hell, sometimes spoken) assumption is that China would be doing a lot better with a Western-style neoliberal economy, which is an extremely funny assertion when all these economies are doing even worse than China is
there's a manufacturing and possibly soon-to-be services recession everywhere. hyperfocussing on China while everybody else metaphorically (and literally) burns around them is just silly.
and, as others have said, the US is literally declaring economic war against China! again, it's Schrodinger's Sanctions! They both exist and are good, but also aren't doing anything and it's all that country's fault! "Ooo, Russia is experiencing a fall in GDP in 2022, this proves that Putin's war machine isn't sustaina--" no, it proves that you've put sanctions on them! "Aha, Cuba and Venezuela's economies are collapsing and they can't afford enough basic necessities, this just shows how socialism is--" No, it proves that the sanctions that you actively boast about putting on them are working! "See, China's economy is now not doing so hot (defined as "only" growing by like 5-6% or whatever), this is really a lesson in how Marxist econo--" Perhaps it has something to do with the fact that you're putting sanctions on their industries instead, the thing you, again, boast about doing?
"See, this patient is blacking out when we put pressure on his carotid artery, this shows how their vascular system is simply inferior to our own (which isn't being actively strangled)!"
the unspoken (hell, sometimes spoken) assumption is that China would be doing a lot better with a Western-style neoliberal economy, which is an extremely funny assertion when all these economies are doing even worse than China is
if this dogshit blind ideologically poisoned take were even remotely accurate we'd have seen India, Russia, etc making gains against poverty that China has. Instead, woops.
those hypercapitalist places arent making strides against poverty?!???!!?!?
No don't you see, all the non-white bad nations are the same and do the same things the same way. Because they hate Freedom!
China's economy is growing while the entire west's economy is shrinking! Here's why that means communism doesn't work and China will collapse any day now!"
If the US doesn't embrace a socialist party we'll go back to a unipolar world and hint it won't be the US running shit for a change.
There is a large country with a large population and a neoliberal order right next to China. We can see how that political arrangement works out in real time.
oh no, beijing's repressive political system, if only they had our blessed American government they could be grinding the working class to the bone so much better 😔 😔 😔 😔 😔 😔
My understanding is that both china and the us get off on fucking over the working class
My understanding is that literally almost all global gains against poverty have come from China, you know the gains against poverty neoliberals like to attribute to neoliberalism?? Haha it's all been in China. China actually plans and builds infrastructure for people to use and live in. Remember all the articles about Chinese ghost cities, with the implication being that China was building a bunch of useless buildings to juice their GDP? Yeah people live in those now.
Something like 95% home ownership? Etc etc etc etc.
I mean are those numbers on home ownership that china reported on itself? First party info is kind of biased.
Either way, china produces such cheap goods by fucking over its workers. Those gains against poverty is still just working class exploitation.
"Those numbers are fake! And if they aren't fake, they don't count!"
remember when the west kept accusing China of fucking with its covid numbers but actually that was pretty much every western nation? lol
Sure do; westerners literally couldn't imagine a non-white country doing better than them.
I remember Westerners malding African countries did better with Covid than them even though they have a lot of things going for them (young population, less densely populated, experience with handling pandemics).
I am never not thinking about how they thought covid was gonna go
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During the cold war, the anticommunist ideological framework could transform any data about existing communist societies into hostile evidence. If the Soviets refused to negotiate a point, they were intransigent and belligerent; if they appeared willing to make concessions, this was but a skillful ploy to put us off our guard. By opposing arms limitations, they would have demonstrated their aggressive intent; but when in fact they supported most armament treaties, it was because they were mendacious and manipulative. If the churches in the USSR were empty, this demonstrated that religion was suppressed; but if the churches were full, this meant the people were rejecting the regime's atheistic ideology. If the workers went on strike (as happened on infrequent occasions), this was evidence of their alienation from the collectivist system; if they didn't go on strike, this was because they were intimidated and lacked freedom. A scarcity of consumer goods demonstrated the failure of the economic system; an improvement in consumer supplies meant only that the leaders were attempting to placate a restive population and so maintain a firmer hold over them.
If communists in the United States played an important role struggling for the rights of workers, the poor, African-Americans, women, and others, this was only their guileful way of gathering support among disfranchised groups and gaining power for themselves. How one gained power by fighting for the rights of powerless groups was never explained. What we are dealing with is a nonfalsifiable orthodoxy, so assiduously marketed by the ruling interests that it affected people across the entire political spectrum.
“During the cold war, the anticommunist ideological framework could transform any data about existing communist societies into hostile evidence. If the Soviets refused to negotiate a point, they were intransigent and belligerent; if they appeared willing to make concessions, this was but a skillful ploy to put us off our guard. By opposing arms limitations, they would have demonstrated their aggressive intent; but when in fact they supported most armament treaties, it was because they were mendacious and manipulative. If the churches in the USSR were empty, this demonstrated that religion was suppressed; but if the churches were full, this meant the people were rejecting the regime's atheistic ideology. If the workers went on strike (as happened on infrequent occasions), this was evidence of their alienation from the collectivist system; if they didn't go on strike, this was because they were intimidated and lacked freedom. A scarcity of consumer goods demonstrated the failure of the economic system; an improvement in consumer supplies meant only that the leaders were attempting to placate a restive population and so maintain a firmer hold over them. If communists in the United States played an important role struggling for the rights of workers, the poor, African-Americans, women, and others, this was only their guileful way of gathering support among disfranchised groups and gaining power for themselves. How one gained power by fighting for the rights of powerless groups was never explained. What we are dealing with is a nonfalsifiable orthodoxy, so assiduously marketed by the ruling interests that it affected people across the entire political spectrum.”
― Michael Parenti, Blackshirts and Reds: Rational Fascism and the Overthrow of Communism
This is the most racist thing I've read in a long while, the fuck is wrong with you cracker?
what up my arguments are racism and more racism. tankies owned.the ping pong authoritarian government . . . winnie the whining pooh . . . shing shong ling long
BEEP BEEP BEEP🚨 ATTENTION 🚨
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Wow, the Western media really can just point you capitalism bootlickers onto whatever country they want you to hate that week and you will turn into a primitive racist sheep right out of 1950s red scare America
Big bad China to collapse upon being viewed under quantum microscope
Ignoring the obvious bias of the author, I will address some points:
In spite of its unequivocal accomplishments and successes, China has, during the past decade or more, spawned a mountain of bad debt, unprofitable and uncommercial infrastructure and real estate, empty apartment blocks and little-used apartments and transport facilities, and excess capacity in, for example, coal, steel, solar panels and electric vehicles.
The author fails to see the bigger picture. Empty houses built when labor is plentiful become occupied eventually. See Pudong, once a "ghost city", now has a population of 5 million. Infrastructure which doesn't directly pay for itself does so indirectly. It should be obvious that extra capacity in solar panels and electric vehicles has potential to be a very good thing.
China’s leaders have been vocal this year about strengthening consumption and about improving the business environment for private firms and entrepreneurs, who have been pressured or punished to align their commercial interest with the party’s political goals.
Oh no, how dare the government force their interests on the poor businesses.
uncommercial infrastructure
Egadds! Infrastructure not used for making money?!
Yeah, we should be building all the solar panels and wind turbines we can build, whether it makes sense economically or not. As long as you can put them somewhere to generate clean energy instead of fossil it's a positive for humanity.
Yeah. Solar panels just fall out of the sky with no assosiated ecological drawbacks.
Compared to burning fossil fuel, it's almost negligible, and entirely localised to where the mining happens.
So its alright as long as you aren't directly affected. Lets push it all onto desperate economies to mine the earth and bear the brunt of pollution while I enjoy the clean air and pristine water bodies.
We can either keep pumping oil and burning it, or we can mine some stuff to build panels that last 10+ years and can be recycled at the end of their lifetimes. It's not like fossil fuel extraction is a clean process (both in ecological and humanitarian aspects), in addition to cooking the planet.
This is just a silly argument. We're already polluting those countries anyway with the current fossil fuel regime. We're already putting massive quarries for the minerals currently needed for energy generation and transmission there (coal, copper, gold, etc). We're already prospecting those countries for oil and gas. We're already chopping down rainforests to get to all these resources, not to mention to clear land for cattle grazing for the titanic meat industry.
Mining has to be done somewhere to create a decent standard of living (though Western lifestyles require exponentially more resources than those elsewhere so we can make improvements on the demand side of things). What isn't set in stone in that the extraction of resources has to be exploitative for the people living in those countries, nor that it has to be excessively environmentally damaging. Which it currently, absolutely is, because the capitalist profit motive dictates it to be so.
Another one after losing one so recently? Taking a page out of the German war manual.
Chinese economy will collapse in just 2 weeks, just 2 weeks! Any day now! What do you mean it was just 2 weeks 2 months ago?
It actually keeps collapsing and rebuilding itself from scratch every two weeks such is the power of Dengism
Christ will return at the turn of the Millenium!
*Millenium turns*
Christ will return in 1156!
*1156 passes*
Christ will return...
Rinse, repeat, forever.
It is 1991. China is about to collapse.
It is 2005. China is about to collapse
It is 2016. China is about to collapse
It is 2023. China is about to collapse.
I tire of these economists. I tire of their predictions.
Lol for real, "China is bad"? Dude have you looked at the US's past especially in the global south? China is run by saints in comparison.
Could it be a rule that titles match the link? This seems to be an opinion piece instead of news but I'll check it out
Neither article nor the OP have credible conclusions to what is happening in China. China is in a debt spiral where possible options are becoming more and more expensive. The biggest property builder (Evergrande) has overstretched and there is a fear it is about to collapse. The people buy property in advance in China, before construction has started. The government will have to step in, but this is going to be expensive by anyone's standards. Think along the lines of the banking collapse of 2008 and then remember this is straight after Covid.
China's belt and road initiative is faring badly. They have loaned large sums to countries that were bad risks. With the world in the state it is currently, a lot of those debts will default. Russia is touted as being one of those, but I think they will give Russia a deal in exchange for cheaper oil. It is not like Russia has a lot of options there.
Manufacturing is on its knees, because of the deflation that is currently hitting the country - Archived link. They have made purchases for commodities to manufacture, and selling those at a profit is becoming difficult. Again government will have to step in here or loose some of the larger firms. Smaller firms will be allowed to go to the wall if they have no resources. China is a country where accountability is handed out at the behest of the party. I would not be surprised to see some managers imprisoned for being at the short end of this one.
The US's ban on tech trades is one that will bite. China will see their fortunes dwindle if they cannot keep pace with tech. This could lead to a backlash by invading Taiwan. This would not be good for any country as everyone buys from Taiwan. I think it is as much as 80% of all chips produced come from there. For high end tech that figure is as high as 95%. This would be catastrophic globally.
This would be a huge gamble for China to take on. If there is a protracted war similar to Ukraine, then this will cause global collapses, as people need tech for infrastructure. And even if China could make a snatch and grab on Taiwan, would the west continue to purchase tech from there in the future? I personally think that if China invaded then they would see themselves in a situation similar to Russia, although not with the pace that Russia suffered sanctions. This would be a slow march into a second cold war.
China has gained an arrogance in thinking that it is too big to fail. It is a form of Trumpism on a national scale. One where it thinks it can just ignore normal restraints due to the influence it has on the world. Russia has woken the west up to this reliance on rogue states. There will be a slow move away from relying on China as a manufacturing base for cheaper goods. The EU and the US have already stated this publicly. If China continues on the path it is choosing then the west will close ranks. This is not in the interests of anyone globally.
This is hardly likely. China has a huge amount of resources to draw. Any fall in China will be a slow grind to a halt. Manufacturing will be the first to slow down as they cannot produce goods without buying materials from abroad. So long as they can purchase those then China will continue.
No you see China has reached the end of the iron fusing stage and shortly the process of nuclear fusion will no longer produce enough pressure to balance the pull of gravity, causing China to collapse in to a black hole. When this happens Mongolian will be spaghettified in the Acretion disk, meaning that giant statue of Chingis Khan in Ulaan Bator will become Loooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooong.
Two of those three articles are from fucking 2021. Let me know when Evergrande finally takes down the Chinese economy.
They were just first google links I found. Joe bloggs has plenty up to date information. Fill your boots.
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this is where you're getting your information? lmao you're beyond help
2021 articles predicting Chinas imminent collapse that didn’t happen then either and a YouTube blogger
Solid.
China has gained an arrogance in thinking that it is too big to fail. It is a form of Trumpism on a national scale. One where it thinks it can just ignore normal restraints due to the influence it has on the world. Russia has woken the west up to this reliance on rogue states. There will be a slow move away from relying on China as a manufacturing base for cheaper goods. The EU and the US have already stated this publicly. If China continues on the path it is choosing then the west will close ranks. This is not in the interests of anyone globally.
Nobody is going to replace China as the manufacturing base. "B-b-b-but Vietnam" There's like two Chinese provinces with a larger population than Vietnam. Vietnam can't even replace two provinces individually, let along the entire country. "B-b-b-but India" India is the world's provider of IT services, not a manufacturing juggernaut by any means. This manufacturing base is not going to poof into existence. And as for the Russian invasion of Ukraine, all it showed is that the West is far more vulnerable and the "rogue states" (ie the rest of the world) don't need to concern themselves with the West for long. Why do you think so many Nigeriens are waving around Russian flags and why so many countries are tripping over themselves to join BRICS? Do you think it's a coincidence that the Nigerien coup was launched while France is still recovering from domestic riots?
India is also in the middle of a destabilizing Fascist takeover by a ethno-religious reactionary force that took evolution out of the text books. They're also going to continue to suffer horribly due to climate change. Bangladesh, right on the border, is one of the primary candidates for an apocalyptic wet bulb event that could potentially kill millions of people and drive millions of more to flee.
China was a backwards nation 20 years ago. Much like India, or most countries in Africa today. The EU are not talking about moving their purchases to other cheap countries; They want that manufacturing base in the EU. If they expand the block in the right countries, then this may be a reality China has to deal with. The aggressive policies China is adopting is what is causing this.
It was China's central planning and independent economic policy that caused it to develop. Those other countries are crippled by Western-imposed neoliberalism designed to keep them from developing.
Yeah, the idea that western neoliberal economies are capable of anything other than self-destructive auto-cannibalism is farcical. How is Blackrock supposed to jack up quarterly profits by building things?!! The UK is already speedrunning a return to a medieval economy. France is fighting for it's life to retain it's colonial possessions. Berlin answers to DC. And the rest of Europe doesn't matter.
maybe 40 years ago. but 20 years ago was 2003. China was not like India or Africa is now.
I would be shocked if they invaded Taiwan and TSMC wasn't reduced to rubble first thing. Having a technological edge is just too valuable to the Western strategy. I also suspect that there would be a significant risk of escalation, because unlike Ukraine the US is already there and already talking about maybe-possibly getting involved if anything starts.
Anyway, thanks for writing an update.
Yeah the US has been far far more outspoken about defending Taiwan than Ukraine.
The Republic of China has something the US wants. Ukraine is just cannon fodder for DC's project to destabilize the RF. They don't give a shit what happens to Ukraine as long as it's expensive to Russia. They don't give a shit what happens to the Republic of China, either, and it's likely that as soon as the US has equivalent chip fabs (if the US is even capable of building something that complex, which is an open question) they'll either drop or significantly scale down their support for the Republic of China.
The US has made commitments to Taiwan and supplied arms. They are also looking to manufacture that tech in the states. I really don't see the Chinese going down that road, but they keep making threats, and while there is threats there is a chance they will be cornered into carrying them out. They certainly will not want to slide back into the economy of the 90's.
China built an economy on consumer electronics and smartphones. That industry is currently seeing a significant slowdown because of a mild recession in most of the world. Now, people are shocked that their economy is slowing down?
China built an economy on consumer electronics and smartphones.
Machinery and electronics only account for about 40% of China's exports and that includes industrial machinery and electronics as well. That's just exports too, so it doesn't include huge sectors like agriculture, infrastructure, housing, and local services.
It really hurts the credibility of the China doomers when you realize that their analysis is predominantly vibes-based.
"the last time I looked at China's economy was in 2005, but I reckon nothing much has changed there since then. hasn't changed much since then in the West, so..."
I don't think anyone has been surprised. The finances of the world have global impacts. China relies heavily on importing consumables to manufacture. This has indeed been part of the issue. This shows up in the PMI where China is sitting in the danger zone below 50.
