PikeCowboy
Junior Member
Yes, and of great importance, all the other countries he/she wants to compare China with, don't do that good.
Chinese Economics Thread
- Thread starter Norfolk
- Start date
Shanghai is targeting advanced industries and manufacturing for future growth despite its lead in service and finance
China and Korea have many similarities but the scale is something that renders direct comparisons suboptimal.
Samsung's revenue (195bln USD) is >10% of Korea GDP (1.7trln USD). Huawei generated 700bln RMB of revenues which was about 0.56% of China's GDP. In Korea, having 1 Samsung would ensure that the country won't do too badly. China needs about 20.
Despite exports only contributing a "small" proportion China's GDP, it has gotten to the point where it is political unfeasible for RoW to keep allowing this simply because of China's scale. Whether such actions are "fair or not" is a completely separate (and irrelevant) point - since when did complaining about unfair things prevented the imperialist countries push China around post WWI? Or did 'fairness' prevent US from invading Iraq? The moralizing argument is functionally useless in this day and age.
What matters is that this type of export growth, especially in higher value added industries, is eventually going to destroy livelihoods of incumbent high income countries if China exported them (planes, robots, CNCs etc) the way China did in China Shock 1.0. Naturally politicans are pushing back (tariffs etc).
Policymaking in 2024 involves responding to such foreign policies - and trying to export your way to prosperity is simply not going to work. Export discipline is relevant insofar that it forces domestic companies to have globally competitive technology - and is relevant from ensuring domestic productivity growth is best-in-class.
Chinese employees worked 49 hours a week in 2023 - the highest in 20 years. Is it not easier to work less and earn more money?
Right. China’s export as a percentage of gdp has decreased significantly and will keep decreasing simply because demand from RoW is finite. While China’s dependence on exports/surplus is exaggerated, complaints from RoW are understandable. That’s why many Chinese companies are setting factories abroad like BYD and Xiaomi.
The mediocre import growth becomes more nuanced if you divided import into resources and high end goods. Chinas import from resource-rich countries kept rising fast, while its import from the developed world dropped simply because Chinese advanced industries are outcompeting their foreign counterparts. The few advanced industries in the west where it still dominates are forbidden to sell freely to China due to self-imposed sanctions and embargo.
Anyway the only solution to absorb the rising productivity of Chinese industries is to further increase domestic consumption by fairer distribution of wealth and more social security
全会提出，在发展中保障和改善民生是中国式现代化的重大任务。必须坚持尽力而为、量力而行，完善基本公共服务制度体系，加强普惠性、基础性、兜底性民生建设，解决好人民最关心最直接最现实的利益问题，不断满足人民对美好生活的向往。要完善收入分配制度，完善就业优先政策，健全社会保障体系，深化医药卫生体制改革，健全人口发展支持和服务体系。
It was stated that ensuring and enhancing the people's wellbeing in the course of development is one of the major tasks of Chinese modernization. Striving to do everything within our capacity in this regard, we must refine the system for guaranteeing basic public services, work to provide inclusive public services, meet essential needs, and provide a cushion for those most in need, and focus on resolving the most practical problems that are of the greatest and most direct concern to the people, so as to meet people's aspirations for a better life. We will improve the income distribution system, the employment-first policy, and the social security system, further reform the medical and healthcare systems, and improve the systems for facilitating population development and providing related services.
FriedRiceNSpice
Captain
Frankly speaking there is nothing unfair about it. China protected its internal market in order to grow its industries, so there is zero justification to cry foul when other nations to do the same. China just needs to deal with it and adjust accordingly. The export driven model has ran its course and accomplished its objectives, future growth will need to be more heavily driven by domestic consumption.
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Why would China go for a downgrade in economic complexity voluntarily anyways?
Strongest military to back the RMB, sure we can do that, would just need to up spending to whatever US has and wait a few years. Strong arming oil producing nations, sure, except for US, the rest won't be hard to get. Printing money out of thin air is possible today because of China's stranglehold over many goods categories.
What would that actually achieve for China? Will it help China keep a stronger industry at home? Improve innovation? If what we see from US is any indicator, the answer is both a resounding no.
It's utterly baffling that the largest economy with 5% growth would voluntarily downgrade to the methods of the 2nd largest economy with 1.5% growth.
As I've already explained you several times over @Sinnavuuty without you seemingly understanding it or you avoiding it out of face saving, national power comes from knowhow and logistics, not gdp numbers. Are you still disputing that?
Someone tell me why a 9.8% growth on top of 7.16trln results in 7.1trln.
They probably just changed what they categorize as "online sales" (I would assume reducing the kinds of activities tracked in the category), so the overall denominator from 2023 became smaller, but not the posted number in the press release from last year. Regardless, total 2024 H1 retail sales amounted to 23,596.9 billion yuan, and 2023 H1 retail sales amounted to 22,758.8 billion yuan, so there was an increase in overall sales anyway.
Also, there's no point in obsessing over retail sales as a category. You cannot equate overall consumption (goods AND services) with only retail sales. Would you say going on a cruise has less of an impact on consumption (in terms of money spent) than purchasing a bunch of clothes and electronics from Amazon which are the same monetary value as the cruise ticket? No, but only one activity can be categorized as retail sales.
Good Twitter thread on this topic:
You are ignoring my question. If you do not know the answer, you are welcome to not respond or hijack the point.
As for that specific point I've actually spoken to Glenn in-depth so you're preaching to the converted.