• bad_news@lemmy.billiam.net
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    4 hours ago

    Okay, then why are Chinese savings rates so high relative to income if they’re well supported by the state for basic care like healthcare needs? Eliminating “extreme” poverty by being awesome at capitalism and maintaining French or worse levels of youth unemployment is the dream of Ronald Reagan, not Mao. Is the right to a job not a BASIC maxim of anything left of FDR, much less Mao?

    • Cowbee [he/him]
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      4 hours ago

      Because prices are lower there and PPP is raising. There isn’t as much of a need to spend and instead they can save. They are “good at Capitalism” because they are using markets as a tool to develop and fold Private Property into the Public Sector as it develops.

      • bad_news@lemmy.billiam.net
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        3 hours ago

        Do I need to try to find the Marx quote about savings and how that’s an admission the state isn’t providing safety in a way that actually undermines markets? I will if I must, but I feel this has to be bad faith if you’re not already familiar with it in this context.

        • Cowbee [he/him]
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          3 hours ago

          That’s true in Marx’s time, in a Capitalist economy. The PRC has a Socialist Market Economy, which is completely different, and moreover is still rapidly developing infrastructure. Healthcare is cheaper and more readily available than in the US as well.

          It’s clear that you’re arguing in pure bad faith.

          • bad_news@lemmy.billiam.net
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            3 hours ago

            Healthcare is cheaper and more available than the US in every non-US economy on the planet. But if I am one of the 30% of young male Chinese who can’t find a job… Developing infrastructure is nice, but, how do empty cities built for the sake of building or subway stops that never open in the jungle miles out of town help anyone? To quote The Little Red Book: “The Communist Party does not fear criticism because we are Marxists, the truth is on our side, and the basic masses, the workers and peasants, are on our side.” Who is arguing in bad faith here?

            • Cowbee [he/him]
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              3 hours ago

              You haven’t provided sources for any of your numbers, and you immediately moved the goalposts when proven wrong. The PRC’s unemployment is nowhere near 30%. Developing infrastructure requires labor, and planning cities for future expansion has helped with China’s rapid progress.

              You clearly are arguing in pure bad faith and aren’t worth responding to.