Look up a video in Shenzhen or Chongqing. Everything looks 2 decades out, and the giant crystal skyscrapers light up different colors. Sometimes the whole thing is a TV.
China surpassed USAmerica in GDP already, but it doesn't look close to tied in development and advanced technologies.
The trains there go hundreds of miles in less than an hour, you could commute across the country every day.
Meanwhile in America the "middle class" is struggling to have some walls and a roof. Record debt and crumbling infrastructure. How is all of this ignored and not talked about everywhere?
IMO Taipei doesn't look nearly as new or cool as the likes of Shanghai, Tokyo, or Seoul. I visited Taipei a few years ago and my first impression was that it was like Shanghai was 15 years ago. Everything was just very worn down. Infrastructure, buildings, and such just looked old and grimey.
That's what I've heard from most people who have recently gone there. But we're not comparing Taipei to real cities like Shanghai. We're comparing Taipei to dumps like LA.
Downtown Taipei vs Downtown LA
Yeah, this is kinda cheating because the LA video has Skid Row, but as even the LA video admits, "it's actually very sad to see downtown LA like this. Much of it is rundown and I hope it has a brighter future."
In fairness to Taipei, it looks older because most of it was built before Shanghai and unlike Tokyo there's less need to rebuild everything after 30 years. Also in fairness to Taipei, it's still a very safe city, especially compared to anywhere in the US.