Is China the nation with the highest social mobility in the world?

[Faiez]

Yes they can have a billion parties. That's why it's such a shame that they're dictated by only two. Theory vs reality. Big deal.

The other reality in China is that everyone can criticize the government. Go visit the many popular social forums. You can see plenty. The only thing not allowed is Arab Spring style riots. This maybe surprising to you, but the u.s. would do the same thing for similar activities.

yes 2 parties dominate politics, but they don't OWN politics. They don't have a monopoly, other parties win seats and independents too win seats. Do you have anything other than that one party of china ? Are other parties even allowed to exist ?

 

[meanderer]

If that 'analysis' is true, then why not the US, the Soviet Union, and China at parity in terms of achievements in every metrics ?

because this world is not about what's good or best, but about what's not that worse.

the US governing is far from perfect but still better than the Soviet or even today's China, that's simply truth. I truly admire and believe in the idea of protecting people from government, and giving people freedom.

however, especially after the 08 financial crisis, we have seen that the US government is becoming dysfunctional. little progress has been made to reform. US faces serious social problems: slow growth, increasing long term unemployment, broken medical system, unsustainable social security, guns, social divide between ethnic groups, ... you name it. the US political system is failing to help the nation reach a consensus and march towards future.

yes the private sector is still very active and leading the world in IT and some other areas, but we human race are facing some different challenges / priorities than pre-WWII or the cold war -- climate change, clean energy, next-gen infrastructure, poverty, etc. the private sector is by nature inclined to pursue short-term gains. we need countries and governments who can commit to long-term goods, not politicians who debate all the time without doing anything.

otherwise there may not even be humans in the future, not to mention human rights or freedom.

the China model is not the best for protecting freedom, but it excels at committing to long-term goals and executing plans that span decades. that's the part that US needs to learn from.

in terms of "achievements", in some areas China indeed does better. arguably China (excluding western parts) has comparative, if not better, infrastructure as US does, and it's still improving. the HSR network is truly remarkable and futuristic. China made significant contributions to eliminating poverty. unemployment rate is lower than US. we don't have gun problems. both US and China are contributing to reduce emission. though Americans often accuse China for emission, on a per capita basis US is much worse than China in terms of emission. and, unlike the US, China is not trying to convert other countries to a certain religious or political system -- look at Iraq or Libya or Egypt, you will see how this kind of premature conversion serves short-sighted purposes rather than long-term goods for the nation and people.

anyway, I didn't intend to bash US, and the US system is still better in many aspects. I just want to point out that it also faces serious problems, and should learn from other countries including China. sadly, most Americans believe that their system is superior in every aspect, is exceptional, and there is no need of learning. that does no good to either US or the world.

 

[cnleio]

many poor poeple become overnight millionaires in China, at a scale which is never seen in the world.

China's NO.1 rich person is Jack Ma, who was a college teacher.
China's NO.1 rich woman Zhou Qunfei was a migrant worker from a poor rural family.
China's previous president Hu Jingtao was a son of tea seller.
China's next president will be Hu Chunhua, a son of a dirty poor rural family

We r just a big developing nation, still not as great as u talk.

 

[meanderer]

yes 2 parties dominate politics, but they don't OWN politics. They don't have a monopoly, other parties win seats and independents too win seats. Do you have anything other than that one party of china ? Are other parties even allowed to exist ?

China does have other parties, and a mechanism for them to participate in decision making.

but the form, be it one party, two parties, or many parties, is less important. I believe what's more important is whether the system provides necessary protection and services for its people, which is often immediate, and holds its people together to overcome big challenges and prepare for the future, which is often long term. I think the balance between these two different kinds of goals is what really matters.

 

[FairAndUnbiased]

I think his college grades were released not his High School ones.

Not sure about Yale but I saw this for Harvard:
"In total, one out of every 20 Harvard freshmen attended one of the seven high schools most represented in the class of 2017—Boston Latin, Phillips Academy in Andover, Stuyvesant High School, Noble and Greenough School, Phillips Exeter Academy, Trinity School in New York City, and Lexington High School."

He went to a school where the odds of him getting into somewhere good were in his favor.

It is because most rich neocons, Wall Street bankers and children of government officials - the 官二代，富二代，N二代 of US - graduated from those elite prep schools that cost ridiculous amounts of money that the average American living in Minnesota, Arizona or Ohio don't even dream of. The poor boys and girls in a rural Ohio town, scraping by on welfare and food stamps in the wake of American deindustrialization, will never see the lofty towers of Harvard.

I'm no longer surprised, of course, by the amazing cruelty and casual dismissal of the difficulties faced by the average American by neocons, Wall Street bankers and Silicon Valley yuppies. Seen too much of it.

 

[Hamartia Antidote]

It is because most rich neocons, Wall Street bankers and children of government officials - the 官二代，富二代，N二代 of US - graduated from those elite prep schools that cost ridiculous amounts of money that the average American living in Minnesota, Arizona or Ohio don't even dream of. The poor boys and girls in a rural Ohio town, scraping by on welfare and food stamps in the wake of American deindustrialization, will never see the lofty towers of Harvard.

I'm no longer surprised, of course, by the amazing cruelty and casual dismissal of the difficulties faced by the average American by neocons, Wall Street bankers and Silicon Valley yuppies. Seen too much of it.

Boston Latin, Stuyvesant (NYC), and Lexington High are FREE FREE FREE FREE FREE FREE FREE public schools.
Anybody who lives in Boston/ NY can go to Boston Latin/Stuyvesant if they pass the exam. Everybody who lives in Lexington (even if you rent a one room shack) goes to Lexington High school automatically (no exam).


The main issue is if you don't live in Massachusetts the odds against you are tougher.
4 of those schools are in Mass, 1 in New Hampshire, and 2 in New York. If you live outside these areas you either have to move to those areas to send your kids to those FREE public schools or pay the money to go the private ones setup nearby (+probably room and board).

I would assume Yale is similar.

 

[gambit]

the China model is not the best for protecting freedom, but it excels at committing to long-term goals and executing plans that span decades. that's the part that US needs to learn from.

The government that is efficient at exercising power for ostensibly 'good' can also be efficient at exercising power for evil.

I often use the microwave oven as an example of how centralized planning can fail the people.

Can the microwave came from Cold War era Soviet Union or China ? No.

The technologies in the microwave oven are well known. EM at certain freqs and amplitude do have visible effects on organic tissues. All three countries, the US, the Soviet Union, and China knew this. All three countries knew how to generate EM radiation and focus said radiation. All three countries knew how to contain said radiation. The problem is that the POLITICAL nature of the Soviet Union and China restricted the dissemination the knowledge of the behaviors of EM radiation.

With the microwave oven, we have...

- Containment of EM radiation,
- Focus of EM radiation,
- A timing mechanism,

Not a single item was beyond the intellectual and manufacturing capabilities of both the Soviet Union and China.

Is the microwave oven a necessity to live ? Absolutely not. Mankind have used simple fire to boil water and to cook food for millenniums.

Further, when the idea for the microwave oven was proposed, there was an argument that people want to see their food. Is there a point in watching one's food under EM bombardment ? No, but people wanted that feature anyway. That mean a glass portal must be in place. But then, how does one deals with EM radiation leakage ? Answer...Install a metal wire mesh into the glass portal where the mesh holes are smaller than the physical wavelength of the EM radiation. Problems (plural) solved. No EM radiation leakage and people can see their food heating up. Were Soviet and Chinese scientists ignorant of these behaviors ? Absolutely not.

But the microwave oven came from the West in the long list of things that benefited mankind came from the West.

The more you control, the more you want to control. The Chinese communists were very good at executing their long term plans and goals, except not a single one of those plans really benefited the Chinese people and the rest of the world. See the microwave oven. It took the spectacular and ignoble collapse of the Soviet Union to force the Chinese communists to see the errors of their ways and adopt capitalism. The funny part is that the benefits and accomplishments of the capitalists societies were well known to the Chinese back then.

Arthur C Clarke actually had an altitude named after him...

Geostationary orbit - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

And we have GPS today. Then Beidou copied the execution.

So please do not tell us how awesome is the long term planning capability of the Chinese way of doing things when we have yet to see the benefits of that supposedly 'awesome' ability.

 

[FairAndUnbiased]

Boston Latin, Stuyvesant (NYC), and Lexington High are FREE FREE FREE FREE FREE FREE FREE public schools.
Anybody who lives in Boston/ NY can go to Boston Latin/Stuyvesant if they pass the exam. Everybody who lives in Lexington (even if you rent a one room shack) goes to Lexington High school automatically (no exam).


The main issue is if you don't live in Massachusetts the odds against you are tougher.
4 of those schools are in Mass, 1 in New Hampshire, and 2 in New York. If you live outside these areas you either have to move to those areas to send your kids to those FREE public schools or pay the money to go the private ones setup nearby (+probably room and board).

I would assume Yale is similar.

I am familiar with the school system in the US. The difference between a public school on one hand and a elite magnet school or prep school on the other is vast. Even a public school in a rich neighborhood and an average public school are like night and day. A kid going to Compton High and a kid going to University High in Irvine, California are not merely not in the same league, they are not playing the same game. Same is true for Oakland High vs. Palo Alto High. The high cost of buying a house in a "good" school district is prohibitive, and mostly limited to big cities. If you live in Middletown, Ohio, USA or something you are going to have only a few options, most of which are pretty much the same, just football and partying.

 

[Hamartia Antidote]

I am familiar with the school system in the US. The difference between a public school on one hand and a elite magnet school or prep school on the other is vast. Even a public school in a rich neighborhood and an average public school are like night and day. A kid going to Compton High and a kid going to University High in Irvine, California are not merely not in the same league, they are not playing the same game. Same is true for Oakland High vs. Palo Alto High. The high cost of buying a house in a "good" school district is prohibitive, and mostly limited to big cities. If you live in Middletown, Ohio, USA or something you are going to have only a few options, most of which are pretty much the same, just football and partying.

It depends upon your town/city and how they vote the local tax money is to be used. If the town raises taxes to pay for a top notch school system it's going to get expensive to live in that town and people who can't affford it will move out. So yes you will be left with an above average income base.

You can also live is some hard core "don't tax me"
town which votes to lower everybody's taxes and thus has some sh*t school system.

You get what you pay for (and what you vote for).
Your other option is to say f*ck to your local public school system and send your kids to private school

There's a ritzy town near me which is not known for its public school system. That's because 90% of the residents send their kids to expensive private schools.

 

[meanderer]

The government that is efficient at exercising power for ostensibly 'good' can also be efficient at exercising power for evil.

I often use the microwave oven as an example of how centralized planning can fail the people.

Can the microwave came from Cold War era Soviet Union or China ? No.

The technologies in the microwave oven are well known. EM at certain freqs and amplitude do have visible effects on organic tissues. All three countries, the US, the Soviet Union, and China knew this. All three countries knew how to generate EM radiation and focus said radiation. All three countries knew how to contain said radiation. The problem is that the POLITICAL nature of the Soviet Union and China restricted the dissemination the knowledge of the behaviors of EM radiation.

With the microwave oven, we have...

- Containment of EM radiation,
- Focus of EM radiation,
- A timing mechanism,

Not a single item was beyond the intellectual and manufacturing capabilities of both the Soviet Union and China.

Is the microwave oven a necessity to live ? Absolutely not. Mankind have used simple fire to boil water and to cook food for millenniums.

Further, when the idea for the microwave oven was proposed, there was an argument that people want to see their food. Is there a point in watching one's food under EM bombardment ? No, but people wanted that feature anyway. That mean a glass portal must be in place. But then, how does one deals with EM radiation leakage ? Answer...Install a metal wire mesh into the glass portal where the mesh holes are smaller than the physical wavelength of the EM radiation. Problems (plural) solved. No EM radiation leakage and people can see their food heating up. Were Soviet and Chinese scientists ignorant of these behaviors ? Absolutely not.

But the microwave oven came from the West in the long list of things that benefited mankind came from the West.

The more you control, the more you want to control. The Chinese communists were very good at executing their long term plans and goals, except not a single one of those plans really benefited the Chinese people and the rest of the world. See the microwave oven. It took the spectacular and ignoble collapse of the Soviet Union to force the Chinese communists to see the errors of their ways and adopt capitalism. The funny part is that the benefits and accomplishments of the capitalists societies were well known to the Chinese back then.

Arthur C Clarke actually had an altitude named after him...

And we have GPS today. Then Beidou copied the execution.

So please do not tell us how awesome is the long term planning capability of the Chinese way of doing things when we have yet to see the benefits of that supposedly 'awesome' ability.

you are mixing different concepts: 'commitment to long-term plans and their execution' vs 'planned economy and centralized control'. that's a common logical error people make.

I very well acknowledge that planned economy and attempt to control everything in the society will inevitably fail, due to the simple fact that one cannot know all the information. but long-term plans do not necessarily mean planned economy, and centralized planning does not mean controlling everyone and everything happening in the society. you can have long-term, centralized plans without controlling everyone, but through incentives to motivate people towards goals.

there are examples of long-term, centralized planning without coercing and controlling everywhere: economic stimulus plans, retirement plans (e.g. 401k), the re-industrialization plan, climate deals, etc. in your examples, please do not tell us there wasn't centralized planning for building GPS, and please do not tell us all the scientists participating in the creation of GPS were 'controlled'.

can long-term, centralized planning fail or be used to do evil? yes, of course. but who decides what's good and evil? no one has the answer. the political correct answer is 'the people', but most of 'the people' tend to be short-sighted (think about environment protection, drug abuse, and climate change). I'm leaning towards meritocracy and elitism.

and when you're talking about 'the benefits' in your last sentence, since you talk about Arthur Clark and GPS, I think you actually mean 'scientific and technological progress' (mixing concepts again). for a lot of Chinese, alleviating quality of life is definitely 'benefit'.

as for innovation in science and technology, yes, US is innovation-driven and China is currently not, but that's not surprising: there is a known path from factor-driven to efficiency-driven to innovation-driven, from WEF, and China is still in early stage of efficiency-driven development. an perhaps far-reaching analogy is China is still a middle-schooler -- usually you don't expect a middle-schooler to be a expert scientist or engineer, do you? but China is doing well in terms of her homework, that is, what you accuse China of copying -- imitation is the way we human beings learn. there is a good chance that in the not-too-far future she will graduate from efficiency-driven economies and become a leading innovator.

(I deleted the wikipedia link in my quote of your post because I'm not yet privileged to post links)

 

[gambit]

you are mixing different concepts: 'commitment to long-term plans and their execution' vs 'planned economy and centralized control'. that's a common logical error people make.

I am not conflating the two, if that is what you thought.

I fully understand the conceptual and philosophical differences between centralized planning and setting long term goals, but I am associating them together because I also understand human nature well enough.

Just about all of us work for and inside organizations at one time or another. Organizations have hierarchies, needs, goals that are short and long terms, priorities, resources of all types, and worst of all -- conflicting desires. It would be great if everyone have the same emotional and psychological responses every time the leader expressed and set forth a goal for the organization, whether that goal is to create a microwave oven or a rubber ducky. But since not everyone are the same in terms of heights and weights which affects ergonomics, not the same in terms of intelligence and education which affects creativity and problem solving, not the same in terms personal lives which affects scheduling of shifts and meetings, etc...etc..., conflicts inevitably arises. So in order to meet the goal of designing the microwave oven and mass production of the same, rules are created and enforced to govern everyone's behaviors to reduce the quantity of conflicts, or mitigate their effects, or hopefully eliminate the environment that fosters conflicts.

If I want to work for Acme Microwave Oven Corporation (AMOC), a closed system, I have to accept certain conditions that will be in conflict with my personal desires and I have to place those conditions at a higher priority than my own desires. AMOC in turn will pay me for my services and compromises I made. As I work for AMOC, my position inside this organization places constraints on my freedom. Obviously, as a production worker, I cannot just simply walk into R/D and start working there. Does AMOC need to explicitly state that only scientists and engineers can work in the R/D labs ? Or does everyone have enough common sense to know their own limitations to stay out of the R/D labs unless he/she have legitimate business in there ?

AMOC can further reduce the possibilities of conflicts by clearly stating that if someone want to work in the R/D labs, certain time in service must be there, certain level of education must be verifiable, and the candidate must prove manual dexterity with hand tools. Departments like Finance, Facilities Maintenance, Production Control, or Executive have their own criteria. I may have a great idea on how to make a better microwave oven, but since there are rules in place to maintain order and discipline, those rules also limit freedoms of expression, which in my case is my great idea on how to make a better microwave oven. On the other hand, the scientists and engineers inside the R/D labs have much greater freedoms of expressions available to them.

The problem with human nature is that once we see how closed systems succeeded, we tend to believe, or rather delude ourselves, that we can control all variables and their effects regardless of whether the system is closed or not. The world have seen the disastrous experiment that was communism, when long term plans and goals meshed with the human desire for control. Just as we have seen how bad decisions ruined a car company versus good decisions profited another car company, we saw how bad decisions made inferior one country to another, all because the leaderships of companies or countries believed they can control everything and that they must control everything in order to meet those long term goals.

You said...

...incentives to motivate people towards goals.

What are those incentives ?

AMOC pay me to work for the company to build microwave ovens. Is the US government going to pay me and to do what ? Propaganda ? Sorry, but that is not going to put food on my table. Take this argument to greater scope. Is the government going to set long term goals and engage captains of industries who then will direct their companies, whether to make microwave ovens or cars or cell phones, so that the country can meet certain economic milestones ? We have that -- fascism.

Under fascism, there can still be the creativity that is necessary in the 'creative destruction' theme that is the foundation of capitalism and free market system, but in lesser degree. Like it or not, China have most, if not all, the characteristics of fascism, and it is understandable that China need to adopt fascism in order lift herself out of the disaster that is communism.

Can the iPhone came from a fascist system ? Possibly, but not likely. Can the microwave oven came from a fascist system ? No, or far far less likely than the iPhone.

The iPhone is an iteration of a communication device, meaning the iPhone have a predecessor -- the telephone. On the other hand, the microwave oven is a standalone invention, meaning someone, be it a person or an organization, analyzed the behaviors of EM radiation, characters of materials such as metals and glass, and the labor intensiveness of cooking, and created the microwave oven.

Whatever the motivation, reasoning, and/or justifications for constraints, the more constraints there are upon the individuals inside the system, open or closed, the less likely the chance for a spark of creativity to be caught and developed. The Soviets beat the world in having the world's first satellite. That was a spark of creativity. What happened to that spark ? The American response may have been out of military paranoia, but it was the American people who developed that spark and made the satellite a much more useful communication device, starting with voice, then video, and to all the conveniences that we see today. Political oppression in the Soviet system did not merely constrained but effectively snuffed out sparks of creativity that could have exploited the satellite.

Modern day China is somewhere in the middle between the Soviet tightly controlled system and the US capitalist free market system. The captains of industries under past fascist Germany worked very closely with the German government to create and meet long term economic goals, just like how China is doing today. But if the Industrial Revolution is used as the starting point for when any country and its political and economic system can be measured against, the capitalist free market system is supreme in terms of allowing the creative spark to be captured and developed with complete disregard for whatever long term goals there might be from the government.

can long-term, centralized planning fail or be used to do evil? yes, of course. but who decides what's good and evil? no one has the answer. the political correct answer is 'the people', but most of 'the people' tend to be short-sighted (think about environment protection, drug abuse, and climate change). I'm leaning towards meritocracy and elitism.

Yes...You seek the mythical 'benevolent dictatorship'.

and when you're talking about 'the benefits' in your last sentence, since you talk about Arthur Clark and GPS, I think you actually mean 'scientific and technological progress' (mixing concepts again). for a lot of Chinese, alleviating quality of life is definitely 'benefit'.

What I meant was that only in an unconstrained system can someone like Clarke can come up with an idea like GPS, have it realized by someone else, and others copied it.

 

[FairAndUnbiased]

It depends upon your town/city and how they vote the local tax money is to be used. If the town raises taxes to pay for a top notch school system it's going to get expensive to live in that town and people who can't affford it will move out. So yes you will be left with an above average income base.

You can also live is some hard core "don't tax me"
town which votes to lower everybody's taxes and thus has some sh*t school system.

You get what you pay for (and what you vote for).
Your other option is to say f*ck to your local public school system and send your kids to private school

There's a ritzy town near me which is not known for its public school system. That's because 90% of the residents send their kids to expensive private schools.

You cannot choose your socioeconomic class, not in the US. It is given to you by your parents and by your circumstances. The poor simply cannot afford to live in a better city with a better school district. They are thus trapped in poverty. You telling them to simply move to a better town is akin to how Marie Antoinette told the French peasants who had no bread, to just eat cake.

It does not surprise me though that you cannot see the challenges faced by the youth of the US and especially minorities/women. There is no wonder why the youth are completely disconnected with the ruling class here. I see it every day - the out of touch professors don't know how the students want to be taught. They try to bring in little tricks like "active learning" and shit, when all the students want is to have the information transmitted to them in a straightforward way, learn the exact way to solve a problem, and apply it. It is literally dumbing down the students. Then they wonder, when they give a test based on standard curriculum, why is it that the students are getting 50% averages and barely know Newton's Laws.

 

[Hamartia Antidote]

You cannot choose your socioeconomic class, not in the US. It is given to you by your parents and by your circumstances. The poor simply cannot afford to live in a better city with a better school district. They are thus trapped in poverty. You telling them to simply move to a better town is akin to how Marie Antoinette told the French peasants who had no bread, to just eat cake.

It does not surprise me though that you cannot see the challenges faced by the youth of the US and especially minorities/women. There is no wonder why the youth are completely disconnected with the ruling class here. I see it every day - the out of touch professors don't know how the students want to be taught. They try to bring in little tricks like "active learning" and shit, when all the students want is to have the information transmitted to them in a straightforward way, learn the exact way to solve a problem, and apply it. It is literally dumbing down the students. Then they wonder, when they give a test based on standard curriculum, why is it that the students are getting 50% averages and barely know Newton's Laws.

There are plenty of poor people who live in Boston and New York City. Having grown up in Boston myself I can assure you there are plenty of poor people there. The entrance exam to Boston Latin can be taken for entering the 7th grade or later for the 9th. It is open to all Boston residents (rich and poor alike). I can assure you the majority of kids who do get in are not a bunch of rich kids. Boston Latin is either the #1 school or the #2 school Harvard accepts students from.

You can then claim that well the kids who live in the poor areas of Boston have to go to local schools which are crappier than some of the schools in the better section of the city. I would agree that would slant the results...HOWEVER to make sure this doesn't happen students are bused from one end of the city to the other to even things out. So some kid who lives in the poor section can end up getting bused to a school in the good section.

Is this true for every school system in the country...I don't know.

Are people completely trapped in their socio-economic conditions...only if they let themselves be. You can claim hey how about Lexington High...it's in an expensive town..how can that be fair to poor people? Well Massachusetts has an answer to that too. Towns are required to have low income sections to give the less well off a chance to go to a decent school system.

Again...is this true for every school system in the country...I don't know.

 

[William Hung]

Are people completely trapped in their socio-economic conditions...only if they let themselves be.

This is theoretically true, but in practice I don't think this is the case.

I've personally seen many instances of good people getting held back due to circumstances that were beyond their control.

Academically gifted people that didn't get the chance to go to university. Good university students that have to drop out. Or even those that graduated but due to the poor job market, they are forced to take low paying jobs.

And there are probably thousands and millions of people that I haven't witness, who are stuck in their socioeconomic conditions regardless of their hardwork. What about kids born in some remote place in Africa? kids born to a poor rural family in South America? they are not going to get far economically. At best, we can blame their parents or their country leaders but we can't put any blame on those kids. Their chances of climbing the social ladder is almost non-existant no matter how hard they work. And it wouldn't be fair to say they are stuck in their conditions because they let themselves be.

 

[Hamartia Antidote]

This is theoretically true, but in practice I don't think this is the case.

I've personally seen many instances of good people getting held back due to circumstances that were beyond their control.

Academically gifted people that didn't get the chance to go to university. Good university students that have to drop out. Or even those that graduated but due to the poor job market, they are forced to take low paying jobs.

And there are probably thousands and millions of people that I haven't witness, who are stuck in their socioeconomic conditions regardless of their hardwork. What about kids born in some remote place in Africa? kids born to a poor rural family in South America? they are not going to get far economically. At best, we can blame their parents or their country leaders but we can't put any blame on those kids. Their chances of climbing the social ladder is almost non-existant no matter how hard they work. And it wouldn't be fair to say they are stuck in their conditions because they let themselves be.

I won't argue the cost of education is a HUGE issue...and not just for poor people. I was more talking about how things have been setup to try and level out the ability of getting in...not paying.

I think it is inevitable that to reduce costs colleges will switch to more of a videoconferencing model than a physical classroom. This way they could have tens of thousands of students per class. The problem is this will water down the education system...but money talks and well that will be the new norm.