China's Extreme Inequality

In this episode of Pekingology, Freeman Chair in China Studies Jude Blanchette is joined by the Andrew Walder, Denise O'Leary & Kent Thiry Professor at Stanford University, and Senior Fellow at the Freeman-Spogli Institute for International Studies. Today they discuss his article “China’s Extreme Inequality: The Structural Legacies of State Socialism (www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi...) .” (The China Journal, July 2023)

[@warsameelmi4801]

Lets talk about the inequality within America and how its drastically gotten worsen since the 1950s.

[@philipwong895]

US citizens are enjoying these long-term benefits of US government policies: Economic inequality, inflation, stagnant real wages for the last fifty years, costly healthcare, an expensive education system, student loan debt totaling $1.7 trillion with an average balance of $38,000, poor public transportation systems, racial inequality, mass incarceration, the militarization of police, deteriorating infrastructure, housing affordability, homelessness, the opioid epidemic, and gun violence. The US military is the most powerful, richest, capable, technologically advanced, experienced, and competent in the world and will fight and defend the US against any country that attempts to take away these benefits from the American people. The US military prioritizes the welfare of the US people and will ensure that they will enjoy these benefits forever. The Chinese population does not enjoy any of the above benefits. The IPSOS 2023 Global Happiness Level Report lists China at number one position with the happiest people in the world at 91%, with Saudi Arabia second at 86%. It is indeed puzzling why the Chinese are not rising up to overthrow their government. The Chinese may overthrow their government, if the government tries to implement property, wealth, gift, or inheritance tax.

[@World-Cyberhumanities]

放你妈的猪屁，你们这些海外华人脑子有屎呢，还幸福指数91%，滚

[@CJ-re7bx]

Those happiness reports dont actually mean anything. I can find another report where China scores terribly.

[@williamwimmer5473]

before you lecture us on chinese inequality, for context be sure to admit how many americans are homeless, numerically and as a percentage of the population. And also, the number and percentage of americans currently legally enslaved in our penal system

[@user-ot9hg9jt7k]

You're not even an american, sorry. I guess you will mass report me after this. So lame CCP bi-tch

[@user-ot9hg9jt7k]

Enslaved? You choice of word is totally CCP style and nonsense.

[@jobloluther]

Tankie retard spotted

[@oryxland3994]

It's obvious you did not listen to it because there are comparisons to the US and there is more economic inequality in China. The guest points out a few reasons for this but a major one is because you cannot technically own land in China, only lease it from the state for 70 years, there is no property tax. And since the new urban middle class generated most of its wealth from "buying" condos they became much more wealthy than those that remain in rural areas who are essentially tenant farmers. The gap between those poor rural residents is more larger than it is even in Russia who after the fall of the USSR divested most of its property into private hands and started taxing it, China never did that. So not only is China missing a large part the tax base that funds social programs in other developed countries it also funnels more tax revenue to the central government that others. That means lower levels of governments that most often offer social assistance programs in other countries have much less money to do so in China and most of the central governments money funds things on the national level like the military. Add in that China has reinstated restrictions that often prevent rural residents moving to cities this has only reinforced the gap as now moving to a city for a better job might be literally impossible. Simply put China collects less tax per capita and offers fewer social assistance programs than other developed nations do, even including Russia. This means that the gap between poor rural residents in China and the more wealthy property owning urban middle class is huge. If China wants to increase spending on social programs it needs to increase its taxation and give more money to local governments to address the issues. Now China has raised hundreds of millions of people out of poverty and food insecurity is pretty much a thing of the past. These are impressive gains but the rapid growth of the last 30 years has led to some problems like this, that shouldn't be surprising. Besides your obvious attempt at whataboutism is pointless anyway since even if there were no comparisons to other countries it doesn't invalidate factual information regarding China. Obviously the US has many of its own problems but next time you might not want to make assumptions without actually listening to something.

[@TheRealIronMan]

@@oryxland3994 Funny enough on the Gini index (the world's most authoritative systematic measurement of wealth inequality) the US hovers between 85.0-89.9, China is between 70.0-74.9, China is not as good as Europe but its a looot better than US as far was wealth inequality goes, you don't see CSIS making 20 videos about wealth inequalities in the US (CSIS is being partially funded by US state department) but they sure are "concerned" about China, this video is just another part of the larger effort of US demonization of China, yes wealth inequality is a real issue in China, but any American trying to make it uniquely an issue of China while not mentioning the US is literally worse in this aspect is a propagandist.