• bad_news@lemmy.billiam.net
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    11 hours ago

    I will give you that they do occasionally hang the odd executive, which I will give props for. I’d probably still be a dem if they had hung ONE executive in 2009. But if I don’t have cash in pocket, I’ll be left to die of treatable disease MORE on the streets of Beijing than NYC post-Obamacare. I’m not saying you need to be 100% there out of the gate, but telling me that I just need to eat shit for decades while not asking for better because it’s all some grand strategy I don’t get is why I’m no longer a dem. I’m not saying everyone with a different opinion is a bot but there do seem to be a LOT of people with nothing bad to say about China and a prewritten 5000 word statement defending them on every topic on here versus my expectations of the world at large, but maybe my expectations are off, I’ll give you that. I am open to the possibility that I’m just out of touch.

    • Cowbee [he/him]@lemmy.ml
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      9 hours ago

      What on Earth are you talking about? The PRC eliminated extreme poverty, you absolutely would not be left to die on the street. You aren’t making any sense.

      • bad_news@lemmy.billiam.net
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        9 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]@lemmy.ml
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          9 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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            8 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]@lemmy.ml
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              8 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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                8 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]@lemmy.ml
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                  8 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.