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nebula8804yesterday at 7:23 PM4 repliesview on HN

There's a lot of nonsense that comes out on both sides of the aisle. I wish there was a solid single source of truth to figure out what's really going on in China and what's really going on behind the scenes in the U.S.

Some talk about how China has some strategic issues, such as do they have a reliable supply of food and energy? (Zeihan etc.)

I guess the energy portion is being solved with renewables. And I guess if they solve the issue of demographic collapse with robots and AI, that's something.

But really, if there's less people and they're getting older, what's the point? What are they really working towards?

This question is also becoming a problem post-Trump immigration ban in the U.S.

Who knows what the U.S.'s demographics are going to look like now?

Trump inherited a U.S. with some of the best demographics of all nations on the planet, especially in the West. And he managed to throw that in the garbage.


Replies

throwup238yesterday at 7:42 PM

> I wish there was a solid single source of truth to figure out what's really going on in China

What kind of sources are you looking for? The Five Year Plans are the best source of truth for what they are planning on doing nationwide. The annual Statistical Communiqué on National Economic and Social Development and China Statistical Yearbook from the NBS contain statistics on how that implementation is going. Then every year the NDRC delivers the Report on the Implementation of the Plan for National Economic and Social Development and on the Draft Plan to the National People’s Congress which packages up the statistics on how the plan is progressing.

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seanmcdirmidyesterday at 9:15 PM

You could just go over there and live for a few years, you can be your own source. But yes, they have energy, no they don't have oil, yes they have lots of agriculture land, no they messed up some of their environment and that will take time to heal, yes they are working on it.

> But really, if there's less people and they're getting older, what's the point? What are they really working towards?

China wants to be a rich country even if their population stabilizes at only 900 million people or so. Mostly they want to avoid the middle income trap, which would have been a problem regardless of their demographics falling off a cliff. Automation is the best way to get around it, and they have enough tech, production know how and capacity, and smart people to pull that off.

China is going to continue doing what is best for it, and they haven't gone stupid like the USA has. Embracing AI for productive uses rather than just fixating on the slop produced is one place where they are racing past the west.

CamperBob2yesterday at 7:41 PM

There's a lot of nonsense that comes out on both sides of the aisle. I wish there was a solid single source of truth to figure out what's really going on in China and what's really going on behind the scenes in the U.S.

I've always assumed that there is such a source of truth, but that I had never heard of it, wouldn't have access to it, and couldn't afford it if I did.

Reading a few tweets from Musk was all it took to correct that misapprehension. It's increasingly clear that nobody at any level of play knows jack shit about anything.

alexashkayesterday at 7:41 PM

> There's a lot of nonsense that comes out on both sides of the aisle. I wish there was a solid single source of truth to figure out what's really going on in China and what's really going on behind the scenes in the U.S.

Isn't this simply the answer?

That what's going on is gaslighting of the public and that there are people behind the scenes and they don't want hoi polloi to know what they're up to?

This geo-politics (or politics) talk is 'intellectual' men's astrology.

When a woman asks me my astrological sign, I know she's a deeply unserious person. When a man says 'do they have a reliable supply of food and energy'...