China Economic Progress

[SPECTRE1]

Much has been made about the burgeoning middle class in China, this success has been attributed to the adoption of capitalism, and abandoning communism. However, is capitalism responsible for their increase in the standard of living? The natural progression of all countries and economies is producing goods and services for their survival. As productivity and automation allows them to produce these goods more efficiently, more resources are freed up to produce what I call non-essential products and services.

In America, bullshit (non-essentials) is your TV, Movies, cars, Facebook, Twitter, smartphones, internet, videogames, college education, sports, military expenditures, computers (personal). These items do not aid in your survival, however, people begin to trade economically with money for these items. Whereas before in the 1800's, people traded essentials such as eggs that are raised for milk, or horseshoes (Essentials for Essentials). Before, 70% of the population was involved in agriculture, now that has dropped tremendously. They are now producing non-essential goods and services, earning a wage to buy non-essentials.

In 1870, 70-80 percent of the US population was employed in agriculture. As of 2008, approximately 2-3 percent of the population is directly employed in agriculture.[8]

Economically, China has improved due to technology and increased its ability to produce essentials, not withstanding whether it adopted capitalism. It also became the hub of producing non-essential items for many other countries, enriching its middle class. Not only is China capable of meeting its own needs to survive, it is also producing non-essential items for other countries for monetary consideration in that country. This is resulted in an economic decline in these countries, while China has gained from manufacturing these items; resulting in a zero sum gain.

Whereas before, it was a closed society, that was not a manufacturing hub for the world. Attributing the expansion of the middle class solely to adopting free market principles would be a mistake. If we removed activities related to export that did not exist under communism, would the increase in millionaires and rise of the middle class be so great?

In countries like Cuba or North Korea, where most people are involved in the production of things needed for their survival, the adoption of capitalism would simply shift production to non-essential, after automation and productivity decreases the number of workers to make the essentials.

If you go to a job that is involved with producing non-essentials, you provide entertainment and fluff up the GDP; however, that does not make you better than a country that devotes more resources to agriculture and shelter. Maybe people should stop deriding 'developing' countries for not manufacturing these non-essential items that consume the limited resources of the earth and end up in the garbage.

 

[Steve Lurkle]

 

[SPECTRE1]

If people in other 'poor' countries spend most of their money on food and shelter, and don't have gigabit connection to get on twitter and facebook, does that make their economy inferior? I say no...


Right now, if people only bought essential things, capitalism in the United States would collapse since only a few people are needed to produce core goods and services needed for survival. The core goods and services would collapse, since people are not trading essentials for bullshit.

This is how we are dealing with automation that has decreased the need for workers. Eventually we will run out non-essential things to produce and have a bunch of people living in poverty under capitalism.