Meowism with Chinese Characteristics

NOW - Trump says Xi is tall for a Chinese man.

I stuck my camera out the car window and filmed a drive-through of a rural village in Zhejiang province, leaving Anji County (Huzhou) and entering Yuhang District (Hangzhou). Shangougou Village (山沟沟村) is small and serene, nestled among the bamboo-carpeted hills. It has just a few streets, a scenic area, a handful of shops, some greenhouses, and a cluster of large village homes. Shangougou is administered by Luniao Town (鸬鸟镇) about 7km away, where you'll find the closest hospital, fire station, and other basic services. It's very similar to the villages of Anji County, but one thing stands out: the houses here seem to be reserved for personal use (and aren't outfitted as guesthouses for tourism). But at the same time, it doesn't seem like many people actually live in them full-time. My guess is most working-age residents work elsewhere, and these villages come alive mainly during holidays, while the elderly stay behind year-round. This vision of rural life isn't representative of rural China on the whole, but it is very typical of the countryside in wealthier coastal provinces like Zhejiang and Jiangsu, where rural prosperity looks less like dense economic activity and more like this: big houses, nice modern infrastructure, and very few people except for holidays. Most people in China would call this level of development "富农村" (rich countryside) and see it as a standard of success that rural areas anywhere else in the country should aspire to - though whether less well-endowed regions can realistically achieve this is another question.

Discussions about China among socialists in the west very rarely bring up hukou, which is odd seeing as it's probably the single greatest systemic inequality in China and the Chinese economy basically would not function without it.

Good analysts will be able to distinguish between adhom semantic nitpickers, and Brad nailing the big calls: - Raised concern on financial stability risks way ahead of ‘08 - Global imbalances ballooning in the 2020s - Germany and China shock 2.0 - Irelands phantom trade stats

So Brad followed up his initial evidence-free claim ("Chinese automakers aren't making money at home") by deflecting with a follow-up claim that Chinese carmaker industry margins are "shrinking" and "eroding". Once again I asked for evidence, which he failed to provide in any meaningful way. Further, he said that I should go out and disprove his claim (burden of proof normally falls on the person making the claim). Despite the quite-childish, intellectually dishonest, and ad hominem-laced responses, I went ahead and did the work that he was unwilling to do (or incapable of) to support his various claims. Fortunately, I am the type of person who reads company financial reports for fun. And to no one's surprise, it turns out the follow-up claim is once again completely wrong.

Why does it only count as value if it leads to financial gain? Is the purpose of an economy material benefit to people in society or is it to boost lopsided paper values that can only be realized by exclusionary conditions where those who don’t have bid up price for those who do?

Not a single one of these people are able to put together and run a functionally competent organization. They’re all just malcontent self absorbed talkers who think big talk is sufficient to turn fantasy into reality. They think you can fanfic a better world into existence.

Today a Chinese court ruled that replacing a tech worker with AI is illegal. I am very interested to look into the details of this case when I get a second.