Chinese Economics Thread

[tamsen_ikard]

For the record, Chinese scientist thinks 700 million is the ideal population size that China's natural resources can sustain.


This means decline is the intent. Whether it can stabilize the TFR to maintain 1 billion or 700 million is the issue (i.e., irreversible or reversible instaneous TFR rate) not the fact that the population is decline, which is the actual intent of the policy.

With Technological and military growth, China should not have any problem securing resources from all over the world to sustain its population. China has this fear of getting blockaded by the US due to the dominance of the US navy around the world. But the world is getting more and more globalized and resources are no longer produced in the same country where its consumed. So, resources should not be the limiting factor for China's population sustainability.

If China grows in terms of GDP and military power as we expect and maintains current trends, it should not have any problem mitigating any kind of US naval blockade. In fact, if China can realize its true economic and technology potential, China's total GDP should be 4 times as much as US due to 4 times bigger population. With this large GDP, it can easily maintain 4 times more powerful navy and probably blockade the US instead.

All of this is only possible if China maintains its current population advantage. If US closes that gap due to immigration and Chinese population decline, then US will most likely be able to maintain its dominant position in the world and China will be under more and more pressure from US growing GDP and military power.

So, if China has made reducing population to 700 million a target, then its a big blunder. I doubt they will maintain this kind of policy. I expect the more China's GDP grows, the more they will have confidence in their military and economic influence in the world. Then they will not have this kind of anxiety to keep 100% self-sufficiency in food and other natural resources. Then we might see policy change that tries to raise birth rate to maintain population size.

The new cold war between the west and China will be fought on all domains and even the slightest bit of advantage will be utilized. US think tanks and other prominent neo-conservative thinkers are already calling for more immigration to raise US population size so that they can blunt China's population advantage. China will not be able to tolerate losing this advantage as well. They will have to change their direction.

 

[donjasjit]

It might be a problem for other countries, but US is by nature an immigrant country. They assimilate people by second generation into english speaking, thanksgiving celebrating Americans very quickly. Most of the migrants are hispanic these days anyway, which have a european culture and mostly white racial background. So, they won't have much problem to assmilate into the mainstream.

It is almost impossible for America to get a population of 700 million by 2100 even with immigration.

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[resistance]

With Technological and military growth, China should not have any problem securing resources from all over the world to sustain its population. China has this fear of getting blockaded by the US due to the dominance of the US navy around the world. But the world is getting more and more globalized and resources are no longer produced in the same country where its consumed. So, resources should not be the limiting factor for China's population sustainability.

If China grows in terms of GDP and military power as we expect and maintains current trends, it should not have any problem mitigating any kind of US naval blockade. In fact, if China can realize its true economic and technology potential, China's total GDP should be 4 times as much as US due to 4 times bigger population. With this large GDP, it can easily maintain 4 times more powerful navy and probably blockade the US instead.

All of this is only possible if China maintains its current population advantage. If US closes that gap due to immigration and Chinese population decline, then US will most likely be able to maintain its dominant position in the world and China will be under more and more pressure from US growing GDP and military power.

So, if China has made reducing population to 700 million a target, then its a big blunder. I doubt they will maintain this kind of policy. I expect the more China's GDP grows, the more they will have confidence in their military and economic influence in the world. Then they will not have this kind of anxiety to keep 100% self-sufficiency in food and other natural resources. Then we might see policy change that tries to raise birth rate to maintain population size.

The new cold war between the west and China will be fought on all domains and even the slightest bit of advantage will be utilized. US think tanks and other prominent neo-conservative thinkers are already calling for more immigration to raise US population size so that they can blunt China's population advantage. China will not be able to tolerate losing this advantage as well. They will have to change their direction.

If population has not decline, unemployment will keep getting worse.
Chinese demographics today is like Korea during 1997. You can see Korea can grow untill industry get disrupted by the Chinese.
But Chinese industries won't get disrupted as automation will prevent any countries from taking Chinese place.

 

[manqiangrexue]

China is in serious trouble if it doesn't fix its population decline problem. Just like population growth, population decline could get exponential. Without population there is no country.

By that logic, you can't spend one dollar because it could be exponential and the next moment you'll go from billionaire to broke LOL. The situation is that China has over 1.4 billion people with a very slight reduction in number but massive increases in education and per capita output. Don't imagine some exponential problem that doesn't exist.

I think Chinese government will slowly raise its desperation to fix the population problem with more and more harsh measures. First it will be enticement but slowly it will become mandatory to have children.

Once again, imagining situations that are not there.

This is summarizing a serious problem to its absolute essence. What is the biggest source of China's power. Its large population of one single ethnic group composed of 1.3 billion people unified under one single country, single culture, centralized government with absolute power.

This large mass is what gives China the power to compete with the collective west. The fact that China's population is larger than the whole west combined is what gives it importance. If China had all these characteristics but only had the population the size of Japan for example, then it would be nothing. It would have the importance of Iran for example, an annoying nuisance but not of central importance for the whole world.

China needs to keep this level of population to be able to gain and maintain its superpower status. Without it, no matter how rich or how advanced it becomes, it will not have global impact.

So, China keeping its population size is absolutely critical to the global balance of power.

Chinese Government will slowly realize this as well and will not be able to just stand idle while China's population keeps declining and their collective power slowly reduces. They will have to take action. Just like growing military power is a national duty for the government, maintaining and growing population size will be of absolute importance as well.

The bold part highlights the underlying assumption for the rest of what you are saying, so I will just disprove that part. In the past, when China was very poor, we had nothing except a huge population of people willing to work hard. We have much more than that now. Over the last few decades, our middle and upper class have exploded in size despite the total population remaining rather stagnant. Now, there is a slight decrease but the middle class still increases in size. It is China's lowest poorest demographic that is in decline and they contribute very little as it is.

If America can rule the world with 300M people, China can do it with less. Our kids dominate every STEM class in every country. Labs all over the world would collapse without the Chinese scientists that drive them. In applied mathematics competitions, no nation can be competitive without a fully or almost fully Chinese team. One on one, we are the best; we out-think our Western "rivals" and they want to take their kids out of schools where there are too many Chinese because they know their kids cannot compete and don't want them to feel stupid. Where our only strength used to be number, now, it is both number and supreme individual quality.

It seems obvious, but it is true. There is a reason why some people call what is happening in South Korea an auto-genocide. The effects are the same as a mass slaughter only with none of the negative moral implications. If you were someone who hated South Koreans, for example, and wanted them to disappear, but did not care to sully your conscience, you would find this utterly delightful.

Seems you are very familiar with this feeling of hating a people without revealing it, thus you find many empty false hopes to delight in. Normal people wouldn't even have thought to say something like that.

By the way, I Googled "auto-genocide" and just as I suspected, it does not mean what you pretend it means. It means when a dictator kills his own people, not your invented low TRF.

 

[henrik]

If population has not decline, unemployment will keep getting worse.
Chinese demographics today is like Korea during 1997. You can see Korea can grow untill industry get disrupted by the Chinese.
But Chinese industries won't get disrupted as automation will prevent any countries from taking Chinese place.

China needs to keep on growing their population, as the major competitors are also using their big population to their advantage. A big population is needed for the economy, science and technology development, military and even a scalable local market.

 

[TK3600]

It is almost impossible for America to get a population of 700 million by 2100 even with immigration.

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US population is declining without immigration. TFR at 1.65. Quality immigration will drop as nation lose economic competitiveness. Illegal migration will continue, but even that has its limits. Sooner or later it will cause social collapse (population will drop), or simply border restrictions. US will top out about 400mil at best.

As far as population goes in future, China 2050 at 1.2 billion still out number US by 3x. The catch is China will catch up in population quality. No reason China can't be 3x richer (PPP) by then, with very conservative growth (less than 5%).

 

[manqiangrexue]

China needs to keep on growing their population, as the major competitors are also using their big population to their advantage. A big population is needed for the economy, science and technology development, military and even a scalable local market.

Keep growing? And according to your calculation, how big does it need to be? Or is it just the more the better? Step outside your building and immediately be immersed in a sea of people unable to walk anywhere? How can America reach the pinnacle of the world with just 300M people? Are they magical or something? Or is 300M enough? Are there examples in the world of countries with smaller populations being richer, technologically more advanced and militarily more powerful than countries with larger populations? How did they do it? Can China do it too, with a population of just 1 measly billion, for example?

 

[henrik]

Keep growing? And according to your calculation, how big does it need to be? Or is it just the more the better? Step outside your building and immediately be immersed in a sea of people unable to walk anywhere? How can America reach the pinnacle of the world with just 300M people? Are they magical or something? Or is 300M enough? Are there examples in the world of countries with smaller populations being richer, technologically more advanced and militarily more powerful than countries with larger populations? How did they do it? Can China do it too, with a population of just 1 measly billion, for example?

The major reason the US is scared of China is because China has a big economy, which in turns depends on a having a big population. China needs to maintain a population at least as big as the US and its allies combined. There are non-US allies with billions of people that China should also deal with at the same time, as these countries are exporting their people in a big way.

The US is already faltering in science research as it has fewer scientists than China. This trend needs to watched.

 

[resistance]

China needs to keep on growing their population, as the major competitors are also using their big population to their advantage. A big population is needed for the economy, science and technology development, military and even a scalable local market.

Keep growing is good when china go lebensraum mode. If arable area and territories stay the same, it's not good.
700 million is the ideal pop or 1.4 billion pop with red flag river diverting indian water to Xinjiang.

 

[manqiangrexue]

The major reason the US is scared of China is because China has a big economy, which in turns depends on a having a big population.

China has a big economy that is becoming more and more technological and threatening to displace American power. America is not scared because of China's population. It wasn't scared 30 years ago when the population difference was higher and it's not scared of India today.

China needs to maintain a population at least as big as the US and its allies combined.

Population of the US is 330M, the EU is 450M. UK+AUS+CAN+JAP+SKOR is under 300M. That adds up to less than 1.1B. Any other major ones? (Oh, right, China has Russia with 140M+ on its side.) So if your statement were to be correct, China can still afford quite a population drop. But your statement has no backing other than just your thoughts. Chinese kids are the highest achievers in all STEM classes and Chinese scientists are the buttress of labs all over the world. Given this favorable 1 vs 1 comparison and that China's everything from economy to technology to education and personal wealth is growing faster than Western allies (which are divided, unlike Mainland China, which is unified), why must we have the same number of people to win?

There are non-US allies with billions of people that China should also deal with at the same time, as these countries are exporting their people in a big way.

LOL What does that even mean? We need to devote people to them??

The US is already faltering in science research as it has fewer scientists than China. This trend needs to watched.

Yeah, and that trend is going to continue because of the qualitative increases in the Chinese population which mean that the middle class and STEM-educated class is rising fast even as the overall population sees a slight decline.