
Is Shanghai Turning Pro or Just Building High? by Nathan Myhrvold - robg
http://freakonomics.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/12/09/is-shanghai-turning-pro-or-just-building-high-a-guest-post/
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markessien
I spent several months in china from last year to this year. I only stayed in
Shanghai for a short while, because the city is built to impress, so it's easy
to get blinded by the glamour.

But all the same, China is developing, and it's developing in a way that is
dangerous to the west. I traveled to some villages where foreigners hardly
ever go, and you see that the government is making a lot of money available to
the people there to build. It's a form of ultra-capitalist socialism, where
the government gives people money to develop, so that they themselves can
develop.

But when I say it's dangerous to the west, what I mean is that it's
developing, but the gap between the rich people and the poor people is still
very clear, at least in the cities I was in. This means that a guy with a
factory can afford to hire WAY more people, and has a lot more choice in his
employees. There is no attempt to bring the workers then to the same level.

This means that building factories and industries is way cheaper than in the
west, and they have a lot more staff for a lot less money. The living standard
will not grow as fast, but the wealth in China will grow quickly.

~~~
eru
And where's the danger you talked about?

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pchristensen
Presumably because the government is ensuring that Chinese entrepreneurs have
access to capital _and_ cheap labor. If businesses developed more organically
with a balance between capital and labor, the Chinese middle class would grow
and China would achieve wage parity with the West and would compete on similar
terms. The arrangement he described would give the advantage to Chinese
business owners and the Chinese government, at the expense of western
businesses and the Chinese people.

~~~
eru
Rising productivity of Chinese workers will raise their wages.

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light3
'Shanghai looked more like Manhattan on a Sunday'

He was obviously didn't know where to find the jackpot.

To experience the real culture of Shanghai you need to live life closer to the
'locals', not in some hotel in Pudong(east), all you'll find there is tall
buildings. Hell I haven't even seen half of the places in those pictures.

If you took a moment to observe the locals that would be culture, the people
in Shanghai are distinct to other parts of China, with traits such as quick
wit and hard work, indeed they speak their own dialect. If he is trying to
find old buildings as evidence of culture, Shanghai is not the best place,
although there are quite a few around, including the famous tourist attraction
Cheng Huang Miao:

<http://outdoors.webshots.com/photo/1108224679049820088RZkVRy>

