I kept hearing and reading that "China's economy will pass the USA's anytime soon" and "China will be the #1 super-economic-power from 2030 on" and so-on and so-forth. Yet, a few factors made me doubt the assertion:
- By Chinese academics themselves, China's population has essentially plateaued, and is going to start shrinking in less than 10 years. Meanwhile, the USA's population keeps growing, thanks to a healthy dose of immigration and very slightly higher birth rate
- The Chinese economy is at the end of its 'low-hanging fruit' economic boom, with GDP-per-capita growth shrinking rapidly year-on-year
My question therefore was: will China's economic engine have enough 'stream' to pass the USA's for a brief number of years, or will the USA/China GDP gap fail to close?
On the chart above (Google/World Bank), it certainly looks like China's economy is trending to pass the USA's in 10 to 20 years. Let's us dig into the data...
China's fertility rate is below replacement rate, and its net migration is negative
China has seen a huge surge of its population, starting at the beginning of the 18th century, and all the way into the mid-20th century when fertility peaked and fell dramatically between 1965 and 1995 where it stayed relatively stable, yet below the replacement rate.
While the mid-80s to mid-90s fall in fertility can be attributed to the one-child policy, the sudden rise in family wealth of the 90s to this day has created a condition akin to every other secular nation in the world; couples are delaying having a child, or do not have one at all, as is illustrated on the chart below.
Furthermore, China's net migration rate is negative (-0.4%) while the USA's is positive at 3.9%.
China is currently facing a situation of a diminishing population trend.
China's GDP-per-capita growth is slowing down at a fast pace while the USA's is relatively stable
The chart below plots the GDP per-capita of a few territories in focus from year 2000. What is interesting to note is that while the world is impressed with China's newfound economic might, its GDP-per-capita is still and order of magnitude smaller than Hong Kong's, Singapore's, Macao's, and the United States'.
This is important to note because although there are a lot more millionaires in China than there are in Hong Kong, Singapore, and Macao combined, it does not mean that China is richer; it means that China is more populous.
And since total GDP is a factor of population times productivity-per-capita, if either variable stalls or reverse, the growth of total GDP can also stall or reverse...
And since total GDP is a factor of population times productivity-per-capita, if either variable stalls or reverse, the growth of total GDP can also stall or reverse...
We have seen before that this is exactly what is happening to the population trend in China; a growth reversal. It is also what is happening to China's GDP per-capita growth trend which rose between China's liberalisation and adoption of market-economics principles in the 90s and the first decade of the 21st century.
Below are two charts where the solid line is the yearly GDP-per-capita growth rate (Google/World Bank) and the dotted one is the trend (calculated by Excel), going all the way to 2030. It is clear that China's is on a rapidly diminishing growth path while the USA is more or less stable (adding the 2018 and 2019 figures would reinforce this stability trend).
To be noted: The CCP is most likely lying about its GDP growth figures
For the computation in this article, I did use the official GDP figures provided by China's CCP. However, there is a problem with these GDP growth figures; no-one knows what they really are and it is very likely that they are not quite as rosy as what the CCP would want them to be.I thought it was important to mention it here because while the CCP can lie about these figures, it will eventually catch-up to them in the long-run (it always does) and it also makes the argument for China's GDP surpassing the USA's even less likely...
Below are some analysis from external sources:
"It's difficult to determine China's true rate of growth, as a lot of government data 'don't make sense,' according to Scissors, who is also chief economist at China Beige Book. For example, the numbers on the economy's size compared with the average income of Chinese citizens don't tally, he said.
Plenty of other analysts resort to their own metrics to get a sense of how the economy is doing.
Research firm Capital Economics examines a range of data including sea freight, electricity generation and financial lending to come up with a proxy indicator. Based on that, China's economy may have only grown by around 5% last year (2018) rather than the official rate of 6.6%."
http://www.aei.org/publication/china-cant-get-its-economic-story-straight/
https://edition.cnn.com/2019/02/11/business/china-economy-growth-data/index.html
https://www.scmp.com/economy/china-economy/article/2189052/china-exaggerated-gdp-data-2-percentage-points-least-nine
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-03-08/china-s-gdp-growth-pace-was-inflated-for-nine-years-study-finds
https://www.scmp.com/economy/china-economy/article/2188567/china-growth-slow-2-cent-over-next-decade-structural-issues
Forecasting GDP from actuals
Using the World Bank's year 2000 to 2017 GDP-per-capita data, I used Excel forecasting feature to calculate the year 2018 to 2050 year of GDP-per-capita for both China and the USA as can be seen in the chart below.
Using population projection from the U.S. Census for the USA population, and from Chinese government sources as well as the U.N's for China's for 2020, 2030, 2040,205, it became easy to project the Chinese and American total GDP figures by multiplying the projected population figures and the matching years' projected GDP-per-capita values.
The computed figures are shown in the table below:
Some observations:
- I didn't have the population forecast data for 2060; that is what has stopped me from plotting the trend to that year. However, it would likely indicate that the USA/China GDP gap would reverse its narrowing trend
- The story of China's growth is one of scale due to its large population, not one of exceptional growth as it mimics all 3rd-world nations growth patterns
- The figures used for China's GDP and therefore, its growth rate, come from the Chinese Communist Party and therefore likely inflated. subtracting 2 percentage points of growth would make the narrowing of the USA/China GDP gap even less likely
The middle-income trap; what is needed for China to exit it
Being based in Hong Kong, I hear a lot of the CCP-apologists' rhetoric about how China is proving to be a new model for the world where an authoritarian regime is creating wealth without a need for democratic institutions such as the rule-of-law, freedom-of-speech, freedom-of-the-press, freedom-of-thoughts, separation-of-powers, etc...
Actually, the data is telling another story; China is following the developing nations pattern to a tee and, as I explained before, while it might feel to the outsider that it has reached parity with the Western world (and the large Chinese cities may be close), China is has reached a level of economic advancement similar to other 2nd world nations such as Brazil, Mexico, Argentina, or Iran. The sheer size of China's population is what made this economic 'lift' different.Bloomberg has a great write-up on the current macroeconomic situation in China:
“The confrontation comes at a critical moment for China as it tries to avoid falling into what economists call the middle-income trap, where per-capita income stalls before a nation becomes rich. Usually that happens because rising wages and costs erode profitability at factories that make basic goods like clothes or furniture, and the economy fails to make the jump to higher-value industries and services.
Only five industrial economies in East Asia have succeeded in escaping the trap since 1960, according to the World Bank. They are Japan, Hong Kong, Singapore, South Korea, and Taiwan.
To join them, Xi must oversee a transformation in China’s markets, injecting more competition in financial services, upgrading technology, and tightening corporate governance, while waging a trade war with a U.S. administration bent on containing the Asian nation’s rise. Xi’s challenge is compounded by an aging workforce, the mountain of corporate and local government debt, and an environmental clean-up that will take decades.
'No major economy that is not democratic has managed to surpass the middle income trap, so the odds are not in China’s favor even without the trade war,' said Steve Tsang, director of the SOAS China Institute at the University of London. 'Abandoning the Dengist approach has raised alarm bells in the West, particularly in the U.S. This makes the task much more difficult.'
(…)
Today, China’s private sector generates 60 percent of the nation’s output, 70 percent of technological innovation and 90 percent of new jobs, according to Liu He, Xi’s top economic adviser."
Until Xi Jinping's took power, it seemed possible for China to further open-up not only its economy but also its mindset; reform the education system so that the individualism required for people to come up with the out-of-the-CCP-box ideas that would revolutionize tomorrow's business.
Instead, Xi's returning to a foregone era of top-down thinking which only works because Chinese company operate in a non-competitive environment where they are heavily supported by the government through direct and indirect investments, through a legal framework that benefits them, and via a laissez-faire attitude when it comes to enforcing employee rights and protection of intellectual property. China’s oversized demographics which flooded the job market with hundred of millions of cheap laborers will be of no use in a Chinese post-industrial world. It is no surprise that the CCP forces technology transfer from foreign companies investing in China; they recognize the current inability of the Chinese workforce for large scale innovation.
Sure, token innovation occurs, but not on the size required for China to exit the middle-income trap.
Sure, token innovation occurs, but not on the size required for China to exit the middle-income trap.
“About 70 per cent of Hongkongers who quit a China-headquartered company blame the office culture and low salaries, according to a study published by recruitment firm Michael Page.
Many Chinese companies are entering Hong Kong as a gateway to tap into the global market. But 44 per cent of them struggle to retain talent in the former British colony, according to the survey polling 2,998 Chinese firms and employees who previously worked in such companies from different industries in September this year.
(…)
Chinese companies are also more traditional with more power difference between the chief executive and the rest of the staff. This may shock some of the Hongkongers who used to work in British companies with a more liberal management style, he added.”
http://www.scmp.com/business/
The true reforms that China will need and could have it claim the title of world-leading economic-powerhouse would be:
The next 10 years will be telling; it is possible that via its indirect imperialist model (aka Belt&Roads), China may achieve its goal but it seems unlikely since that model is based on 2nd world 'brick&mortar' growth.
20th century China has seen the country mostly adopt Western governance principles. In 1949, China adopted the Western system of Communism which has failed them miserably. Then, they adopted the Western system of globalised capitalism which has saved them. Whether China can accept the final Western system of social-democracy which will bring them to the next level of growth, with freedom as a by-product, remains to be seen...
P.S. Have a read at the following article which paints an interesting picture of the CCP's 'economic miracle':
https://www.hongkongfp.com/2018/12/02/chinas-communist-economic-system-not-good-model-world-china
The true reforms that China will need and could have it claim the title of world-leading economic-powerhouse would be:
- Reform the education system so individual thinking is favored over CCP reverence and unconditional Chinese patriotism so China can leverage its population into a nation of individual thinkers that will bring unmatchable (due to sheer number) new ideas to market
- Strongly enforce intellectual-property (IP) laws locally and internationally and crack down on copyright infringements at all levels so the international community can have faith in its ability to share technological advancements with China
- Reform the legal system to implement proper rule-of-law as it is a condition for the success of long-term international trade, and to prevent capital outflow due to the rich leaving China for jurisdiction where the legal system is more predictable
- Ending the one-party system would guarantee that failed economic and social leadership such as Jinping's will have checks-and-balance and won't be allowed to take the country down disastrous path such as Mao's Cultural Revolution
The next 10 years will be telling; it is possible that via its indirect imperialist model (aka Belt&Roads), China may achieve its goal but it seems unlikely since that model is based on 2nd world 'brick&mortar' growth.
20th century China has seen the country mostly adopt Western governance principles. In 1949, China adopted the Western system of Communism which has failed them miserably. Then, they adopted the Western system of globalised capitalism which has saved them. Whether China can accept the final Western system of social-democracy which will bring them to the next level of growth, with freedom as a by-product, remains to be seen...
P.S. Have a read at the following article which paints an interesting picture of the CCP's 'economic miracle':
https://www.hongkongfp.com/2018/12/02/chinas-communist-economic-system-not-good-model-world-china
P.P.S. I hear some ultra-China nationalists saying "The U.S is just afraid that they are no longer going to be the world's superpower and they are anti-China racists, blah blah blah". I think that's bunch of bull; the U.S is afraid that a dictatorship would gain the top-spot by way of cheating and stealing, which is largely what China does. Actually, there's already another economic power with a GDP right about the same size as the U.S'; Europe. Major trade wars between the two? Nope...
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Data sources:
https://www.populationpyramid.net/china/2040/
https://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/library/publications/2015/demo/p25-1143.pdf
https://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/library/publications/2015/demo/p25-1143.pdf
GDP growth rates data source: World Bank via Google
2019-07-25 Update: It seems that some people in China do get it:
“We shouldn’t focus too much on indigenous innovation that is fully under our control. We need to build up a global value chain, not a Chinese one,” according to a memo published by the Institute of International and Strategic Studies at Peking University in Beijing.“We can’t develop China’s hi-tech industry with the mindset that developed China’s first nuclear bomb and satellite [in 1960s].”
“The ultimate goal of China is to overcome the middle income trap, to enrich the Chinese people, not to compete against the US,” it added.
China is looking to avoid the so-called middle income trap, a development stage where a country attains a certain level of income but then stagnates and remains at the same level because it cannot progress from low-cost manufacturing into hi-technology industries.
The scholars argued that China must learn a lesson from telecommunication equipment makers ZTE and Huawei and ensure firms comply with the laws of other nations if they want to operate globally.
“China should guide its businesses to obey rules and regulations in cross-border deals as a way to avoid giving excuses [to others] and to mitigate risks,” the scholars added.
“The US government is able to tighten its control over intellectual property rights, logistics and the financial system on a global scale via administrative and legal means – that would restrict China’s technology development in the short term,” the scholars said.
“At the right time, China should propose to the US that they engage in dialogue over cyberspace security and technology competition … to boost trust and to reduce suspicion.”
https://www.scmp.com/economy/china-economy/article/3019885/china-should-drop-nationalistic-approach-manage-tech-war-risk
China’s enormous debt ‘no longer can be ignored,’ analyst says
https://www.cnbc.com/2019/08/23/chinas-debt-levels-amid-its-slowing-economy.html
Low R&D Spending May Be China’s Achilles’ Heel
+Most companies don’t invest nearly enough in cutting-edge technology to compete with the rest of the world.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-08-12/low-r-amp-d-spending-may-be-china-s-achilles-heel
China's economy slowing below 6%
https://www.inkstonenews.com/china/chinese-gdp-growth-fall-below-6-2020-says-think-tank/article/3037728
China admits that it will need to fudge the numbers
https://www.scmp.com/economy/china-economy/article/3036745/china-could-smooth-over-census-data-meet-growth-target
(2020-08-07 update)
//China ready to start talks with U.S. at ‘any level,’ foreign minister says
Foreign Minister Wang Yi said China rejects any attempt to create a “new Cold War” and urged a resumption of talks with the United States at any level about any issue as the relationship between the world’s two biggest economies hits its lowest ebb in decades.
In a wide-ranging interview with the official Xinhua News Agency Wednesday, the state councilor and top diplomat said China “is not the former Soviet Union” and has “no intention of becoming another United States.”
China “rejects any attempt to create a so-called new Cold War,” Wang said. “Anyone who tries to start a new Cold War in the 21st century will be on the wrong side of history and will only be remembered as the one who has upended international cooperation.//
Reading between the lines; there is internal dissent within the CCP, with Xi's imperialistic and ultra-nationalistic 'plans' being questioned. Furthermore, some Chinese leaders realize that artificial growth fueled by the state is unsustainable and that unless they patch it up with the U.S, China's economy will run out of fuel.
https://www.caixinglobal.com/2020-08-06/china-ready-to-start-talks-with-us-at-any-level-foreign-minister-says-101589640.html
(2020-11-09)
Xi Jinping says ‘completely possible’ to double size of economy by 2035, despite foreign hostility
15 years to double its national income. U.S. will easily do this in the next 15 years. Another evidence that China will not catch-up to the U.S.
https://www.scmp.com/economy/china-economy/article/3108767/china-gdp-xi-jinping-says-completely-possible-double-size
(2020-11-22)
"Will China double the scale of its economy by 2035, as President Xi Jinping proposed at a Communist social gathering convention three weeks in the past? To take action, the Chinese language economy should develop yearly by simply over 4.7 per cent on common for the following 15 years. It grew by 6.1 per cent final yr, and by 6.7 per cent yearly over the earlier 5 years.
In that context, 4.7 per cent a yr appears fairly manageable. However whereas the calculations could seem simple, there are economic and demographic constraints that are not.
Each nation that adopted the high-savings, investment-led development mannequin that China adopted within the early Nineteen Nineties — corresponding to Japan within the Nineteen Seventies and Eighties, or Brazil within the decade earlier than — has gone by way of three distinct levels. The primary stage, characterised by heavy funding in badly-needed infrastructure, delivered a few years of speedy however unbalanced development. In that stage, debt grew according to the economy as a result of when debt principally funds productive funding, gross home product grows sooner than debt.
Within the second stage, as every nation sought to rebalance demand away from funding, usually with little success, development remained pretty excessive, though now pushed more and more by non-productive funding. When this occurs, complete debt within the economy should develop sooner than GDP. So the debt burden rose.
Lastly within the third stage, the nation both reached its debt capability limits or a apprehensive authorities took steps to forestall debt from rising additional. Both manner, the economy was pressured lastly to rebalance away from funding and in direction of consumption amid far slower, typically even unfavourable, development.
China right now is clearly within the second stage. Between 1980 and 2010, Chinese language GDP doubled 4 instances, however debt ranges have been low and rose slowly. Nevertheless, between 2010 and 2020 when GDP doubled once more, China did so by tripling its total debt burden to $43tn, in order that it now stands, formally, at over 280 per cent of GDP.
Assume conservatively that the connection between debt and development doesn’t change, and China’s debt-to-GDP ratio may have to rise to over 400 per cent by 2035 if it is to double GDP once more. This is a stage that might be unprecedented in historical past. In every single place else, development collapsed lengthy earlier than money owed reached ranges shut to this.
China can in precept cut back its dependence on debt by shifting home demand from funding to consumption, as Beijing has lengthy proposed. But this requires that the household income share of GDP rise from roughly 50 per cent right now to at the very least 70 per cent.
Beijing has lengthy wished to do that however with restricted success, regardless of a decade of making an attempt. There is nonetheless little to recommend the social gathering is keen to sort out the institutional implications of the large wealth transfer from native governments and elites to households this entails.
There is additionally a demographic problem. From the late Nineteen Seventies, China benefited from a quickly rising working-age inhabitants, however this reversed round a decade in the past. In truth, over the following 15 years, whereas China’s inhabitants will develop by an estimated 1.5 per cent, its working population will decline by an astonishing 6.8 per cent, and can proceed to decline for the remainder of the century. To place it in context, whereas right now there are 4.7 Chinese language of working age for each equal American, by the top of the century there will probably be solely 2.4.
This has financial implications. Attaining GDP development of 4.7 per cent with a declining working inhabitants requires as a lot productiveness development per employee as 5.2 per cent GDP development with a steady working inhabitants. Progress in Chinese language labour productiveness has in reality fallen steadily since 2010. Trying forward, a declining working inhabitants requires that the tempo of this decline in productiveness drops by practically two-thirds if China is to double GDP by 2035.
None of which means that Mr Xi’s aim is unimaginable, however we should recognise the constraints. Absent China discovering a wholly new engine of financial development to take up the large quantity of debt-financed spending that now goes into non-productive investments, China can double GDP by 2035 solely underneath one among two situations.
Both there is in impact no restrict to China’s debt capability, or Beijing boosts consumption by managing a large redistribution of revenue to atypical households. Historical past means that the previous is not possible, and that the latter will set off substantial and unpredictable political and social change. Both manner, it is an unlikely wager."
https://timesnest.com/xis-aim-to-double-chinas-economy-is-a-fantasy/
https://www.ft.com/content/8cc6f95e-89c2-4bf3-9db3-eafd481f1f37
(2020-12-27)
"Building the algorithm commons: Who discovered the algorithms that underpin computing in the modern enterprise?"
(update 2021-02-10)
Number of newborns registered in China drops 15% amid population decline fears.
(update 2021-04-20)
"China’s population is set to peak in just four years’ time and the milestone will be marked by a significant downturn in consumer demand, an adviser to the central bank has warned.
“When the total population enters negative growth [after 2025], there will be a shortage of demand,” Cai Fang, a member of the monetary policy committee of the People’s Bank of China (PBOC), was quoted as saying in a report by Shanghai Securities News on Friday."
(update 2021-07-13)
(update 2021-10-06)
China Import & Exports
China Import & Exports
(update 2022-01-31)
China Can’t Afford to Decouple from the West
"Chinese leaders should know far better than most the risks of self-isolation. Decades of inward-looking policies under Mao Zedong left tens of millions of Chinese dead and the country entrapped in poverty. Only after Deng Xiaoping introduced his liberalizing reforms in 1979 did the economy begin to take off. Severing ties forged over four decades of integration with the West will make an already slowing Chinese economy less, not more productive."
"Nor is there much reason to think China can succeed in its aim of achieving self-sufficiency by fiat. While the country’s technological capabilities have grown immensely over the years, the government can hardly take credit. Years of massive investments have not paid off. One academic study estimates that China spent 550 billion yuan ($88 billion) supporting various industrial projects between 2006 and 2013 yet produced only 145 billion yuan in net profits for domestic firms and 230 billion yuan in export gains. In other words, China’s industrial policy during this period generated a net loss of 175 billion yuan ($28 billion).
"Nor is there much reason to think China can succeed in its aim of achieving self-sufficiency by fiat. While the country’s technological capabilities have grown immensely over the years, the government can hardly take credit. Years of massive investments have not paid off. One academic study estimates that China spent 550 billion yuan ($88 billion) supporting various industrial projects between 2006 and 2013 yet produced only 145 billion yuan in net profits for domestic firms and 230 billion yuan in export gains. In other words, China’s industrial policy during this period generated a net loss of 175 billion yuan ($28 billion).
Beijing has also greatly underestimated the challenge of establishing a sanctions-proof chipmaking industry. The foundation of global technology supply chains is specialization. Individual players — companies in different countries — acquire unique capabilities, enabling them to focus on a particular technology and constantly innovate. No single country or company can dominate or monopolize the entire supply chain.
According to the Semiconductor Industry Association, there are more than 30 types of specialized semiconductor product categories. Making a chip requires as many as 300 different inputs, which are in turn processed by more than 50 types of specialized equipment. Even the U.S., the industry leader, is incapable of building a completely indigenous semiconductor supply chain. While China reportedly is planning to spend $1.4 trillion over the next five years pursuing that goal, the odds of success are slim.
China’s efforts to reduce its reliance on food imports, which reached $108 billion in 2020, seem similarly destined to fail. Because about a quarter of the country’s food imports come from the U.S., Chinese leaders fear Washington could impose an embargo in any future confrontation, as it did after the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan in 1979.
The costs of eliminating that dependence are likely unsustainable. To take just one example, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the per hectare yield for soybean farms in China’s Heilongjiang province is a third lower than in the American Midwest, while the cost of producing a metric ton of soybeans in China is more than twice that in the U.S. Given that U.S. soybeans alone account for roughly 11% of China’s overall food imports, replacing them with domestic supplies would be prohibitively expensive."
The costs of eliminating that dependence are likely unsustainable. To take just one example, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the per hectare yield for soybean farms in China’s Heilongjiang province is a third lower than in the American Midwest, while the cost of producing a metric ton of soybeans in China is more than twice that in the U.S. Given that U.S. soybeans alone account for roughly 11% of China’s overall food imports, replacing them with domestic supplies would be prohibitively expensive."
(update 2022-05-01)
(Update 2023-02-07)
The current average decline rate since Xi took power is a slow down of population growth of a million people a year. And these are the official stats. It is likely that China never reached 1.4B population and that 3 years of Covid with tens of millions of undeclared deaths will have much more dire consequences.
"China’s National Bureau of Statistics on Tuesday announced a decline of 850,000 people to a new total population of 1.4118 billion — the first such decline in 60 years. The birthrate reached its lowest level on record, at 6.77 per 1,000 people, down from 7.52 in 2021.
The last time China’s population declined was in 1961, after three years of famine caused by Mao Zedong’s disastrous Great Leap Forward industrial policy, along with floods and drought.
(...)
The government’s efforts to reverse the falling birthrate began in earnest in 2016, when it ended the one-child-per-family rule, placing the restriction at two children instead. But neither that revision nor a 2021 adjustment to allow three children has slowed the downward trend
(...)
China’s rapidly aging society will undercut Beijing’s vision of itself as an ascendant power poised to overtake the United States. "
(update 2023-05-12)
"An executive at a real estate developer in Hong Kong said the difficulties of doing due diligence in China is deterring investors from buying assets in the mainland because of the risk of hidden debts. Such concern is only likely to be exacerbated by President Xi Jinping’s campaign against foreign due diligence companies.
Even businesses that do invest are taking a cautious approach, preferring to focus on their own operations in China instead of direct cash investment, said Gary Lam, founder and chief executive officer of Asia CEO Community, a membership club headquartered in Hong Kong that’s focused on growing a network of business leaders.
“They want to be in control of their companies because their trust in the Chinese government and its current business environment has been eroded amid the myriad of government crackdowns and a constant change in policies,” said Lam."
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-05-11/china-is-scaring-away-foreign-investors-that-its-cities-want
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-05-11/china-is-scaring-away-foreign-investors-that-its-cities-want
(update 2024-02-27)
"Xi Crackdown on ‘Hedonistic’ Bankers Fuels Industry Brain Drain(...) indications are growing that Xi is shifting away from four decades of market-oriented reforms and financial innovation. The most powerful Chinese leader since Mao Zedong has emphasized the Communist Party’s “centralized and unified leadership” of the sector and pledged to build “a modern financial system with Chinese characteristics” that’s completely different from the West."
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-02-26/xi-crackdown-on-hedonistic-bankers-fuels-industry-brain-drain?accessToken=eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJzb3VyY2UiOiJTdWJzY3JpYmVyR2lmdGVkQXJ0aWNsZSIsImlhdCI6MTcwOTA2NTk1NSwiZXhwIjoxNzA5NjcwNzU1LCJhcnRpY2xlSWQiOiJTODQxTDZUMEcxS1cwMCIsImJjb25uZWN0SWQiOiI2RDQ5QkZBMjRCNUE0OTgyODg3RUYxRDExOTdDMEE1MiJ9.u0btHRbFvEXqfqOzrNQZf2ablMhStKfP_tOHvgPscQY
(update 2024-04-01)
Yi Fuxian has been researching China's population patterns for years. I did not know about the guy until very recently. His assessment is that China's population has been decreasing even faster of for longer than what I hypothesized; with a peak in 2017 at less than 1.3B people!
Source here, here, and here.
Yi Fuxian has been researching China's population patterns for years. I did not know about the guy until very recently. His assessment is that China's population has been decreasing even faster of for longer than what I hypothesized; with a peak in 2017 at less than 1.3B people!
Source here, here, and here.
