Adding all this to their incoming population bubble and it doesn't seem like anything is coming up roses for China.
How do they expect to pay back all this debt with a rapidly aging population? By the 2050-2060s over HALF their population will be over the age of 65, and not a western relatively healthy 65 either.
The massive pollution problems, no social safety net, and no work pensions will be adding responsibilities on to the shrinking workforce.
Their government seems hellbent on ignoring any future consequences(past 5 years) and only focusing on staying in power today.

Just for reference: Credit Suisse numbers

https://en.wikipedia.org/wi...

China's wealth in 2010 ...18.0 Trillion USD.....in 2016... 23.4 Trillion USD
U States wealth in 2010 ..60.6 Trillion USD....in 2016.. 84.8 Trillion USD

As you know "wealth" is "assets minus liabilities"...including debt as a liability.

The US's wealth is growing much faster than that of China, despite China's better GDP rate. Why? Productivity and return on investment numbers in China are poor.

population of China, 1.4 billion and getting old fast
population of USA 0.33 billion and holding its own age wise.

The math does not support your assertion.
I just compared the wealth of China 7 years ago and now, with the US wealth 7 years ago and now. Did you not understand?

The wealth of China has increased 5.4 Trillion USD during that period.
The wealth of the US has increased 24.2 Trillion during that same period. If that is "regressing" to you, well...I can't see how you come to that conclusion.

If I had gone back 17 years the baseline numbers would have been
42.3 Trillion for US
4.3 Trillion for China.

That would make China's 17 year increase 19.1 Trillion
That would make the US 17 year increase 42.5 Trillion

So as you can see, the gap in wealth widened in the 2010-2017 period relative to the 2000-2010 period.

China's GDP growth has outstripped the US's, but poor productivity and poor return on investment numbers have made China's growth of wealth significantly hampered. Can't you see that?

Even if you can't or won't see that, it is still true.

I'm not discounting the terrific growth in China's coastal regions, or her achievement in lifting so many hundreds of millions out of poverty. But what I showed you is still true.

For somebody who appears well versed with numbers, I would strongly urge you to look again at your population figures.

You stated China has population of ~ 1.4 trillion, with America's at ~ 0.33 trillion - that's 1.77 trillion, or 1,770 billion.

Earth's population, according to the world population clock, has only recent crept over 7.5 billion.

You've also only considered wealth in GDP terms. Many economists consider PPP as a much better yardstick for comparing national economies, or national power in economic terms.

As you would likely suspect, one dollar spent in China would buy you considerably more goods or services than one spent in the U.S.

Food for thought anyway.

Thanks! I meant "billions", i'll fix it.

I've been here in China this last five years, on and off, mostly on.
A dollar does go farther than in the US, most places, but not insanely farther. I am in a second tier city. Some cities like Beijing and Shanghai are expensive. Try and rent a place in Beijing. Wow!

PPP is a useful measurement, for talking about the size of a domestic economy. I always like this short, cogent explanation of real, PPP and nominal GDP measures.

https://applebutterdreams.w...

The guy I was writing to deleted his posts, but I focused more on wealth than GDP. If the size of the economy is large, but it is losing money....

That's an important part of the Chinese economy, poor productivity and return on investment numbers. Mind you, there's nothing wrong with the Chinese people here. I'm not slamming them, they're great.

But allocation of economic activity has been weird.

For instance, provinces were under tremendous pressure to show growth. so they borrowed and built, built, built, and the sizes of their economies did jump. But a lot of those projects were never completed (30%) and many others didn't make money.

So the provinces have huge debt they can never repay. The central government still has 3 trillion in forex reserves, but they are not going to throw that away covering bad, unrecoverable debt, and it wouldn't be enough anyhow. They've been rolling over this debt, the banks and the construction firms are often State Owned Enterprises (SOE's), but that tactic is reaching its limit.

One can see that in the startling increase in the rate of debt growth. You may have noticed Chinese bonds were downgraded a little bit yesterday. Nothing drastic, but it is the first downgrade since 1989.

Until return on investment and productivity improve a lot, they've got a big problem. Mind you, again, this is not a slam on the Chinese worker. My colleagues are generally conscientious, hard working and so forth. Fine to work with. It is the way investment has been allocated that has failed them. I'm no economic expert, just a science guy.

First of all he does not know the difference between billion and trillion. Right there in step one he just failed. We don't have to go any further.

So, a simple spelling error makes his entire argument invalid(that he apologized and fixed after an earlier reply). Talk about shooting the messenger because he comes with bad news.

China faces some very large structural and environmental problems, and if their government continues to bury their heads in the sand and ignore them. Their downfall could take trillions of dollars away from the poorer economies they are invested in. Not to mention dragging down the entire worlds economy for years of not decades.

I'm guessing your a Chinese national who is very proud of his country(and rightly so), but refusing to acknowledge the problems inherent in the communist's economic system. Can and will lead to a very harsh lesson, the likes of which Russia is still paying for decades after hers.

avoidance.

I find discussions on China absolutely fascinating.

If you contrast China under the pre-reform era to where it is now, it's staggering. I think it was Martin Jacques who compared the industrialisation of China to that of the United Kingdom, as being on 100 times the scale and 4 times more rapid.

Some of the challenges they've had to overcome in that time - or are still yet to overcome - are without precedent.

I wouldn't contest any of your views, but when you look back what the CCP have achieved it would take a brave man to bet against them.

I'm an accountant by the way, so no economic expert either, but being someone who has a fairly strong grasp of numbers there is no better country in the world which produces statistics quite like the Chinese.

Wasn't there one statistic which claims the Chinese consumed more cement in 3 years between 2011 and 2013 than the U.S consumed in the entirety of the 20th century - again, remarkable.

I'm curious to hear what this second-tier city is, by the way. Possibly one of the over 100 which million persons residing in them.

I met an American some time ago, who remarked on his visit to China as, ''arriving at the airport with this I'm American, we're the best attitude'' to returning home and feeling totally humbled by the scale and modernity by what he witnessed.

I must confess I've never been, although 2018 might be the year I do.

Yeah the post Deng growth is a stupendous achievement. Amazing ...historic...and your thing about the concrete...I don't know if that number is right, I kind of doubt it. But they do use more than anyone else. But what I wrote is also true. And the ghost cities thing is real, I've seen a half dozen. Half completed groups of dozens of hi rises, crumbling in the weather even before they were completed.

You may find this hard to believe, but I didn't come to China with a jingoistic attitude, nor am I jingoistic. I despise jingoism. American exceptionalism included. What nonsense.

The US rose to her historically brief unipolar moment due to extremely fortunate geography, world events that devastated other power centers, a pretty good political system, some lucky choices, a few good knowing choices, strong civic institutions and some other factors. But not because of some mystical kind of inherent superiority.

I find the Chinese people fine. People, like every one else. Some guy came up to me yesterday screaming some foul stuff, an anti- American harangue with threats, but that's very rare. I wasn't scared. Actually I saw pain in the guys face.

I work for a university and so mostly see students and instructors...and parents... but of course shopkeepers and so forth as well. And business and radio people and athletes and navy personnel.

I'm quite active, the university gets as much mileage out of me as my advanced age permits. They loan me out to photo ops, radio interviews, to groups of state athletes and the navy, and I'm happy to help. I'm having a ball.

And the uni is very nice about scheduling my day with open blocks so i can get some rest. I asked for this ahead of time as I knew it would enhance my productivity, they found me a place so close I can get from laboratory to my flat in an 8 minute walk. And in the flat I have a fancy printer I lease. So i can do stuff and print a whole bunch of paper in a hurry if i want to.

They know i like to work early in the morning and dislike evening work unless I can have a sleep in the afternoon. So if I am going to give a speech at night or something...I sneak out, go home, sleep four hours and clean up..then the old man is fresh and alert again.

I have a full class schedule and old grandfather's classes are popular, and i do see a lot of students in liberal office hours, but it is all fun to me....and I'm exempt from clock punching and all that. I come and go as I please and they trust me to meet my commitments. I often meet students at coffeehouses for exam prep. Once in a while they take me to a movie or something. I really love my situation.

But the Chinese people and the CCP are two distinguishable things. You will find a tremendous amount of totalitarian disinformation being disseminated by the CCPPD. There is a very deliberate and aggressive "three warfares" culture behind it. And everyone knows it, though opinions about it vary widely.

I will also say that when senior party people visit the university, the staff is truly anxious. Party officials have unchecked power, and do not answer to law, courts, Constitution, police, military,..they are the authority above everything. There is no check on them. They hold the "permanent record" and future of all our employees in their hands (save me and a few other expats). I suspect you don't know what that is like.

Don't believe me?
try this:
http://www.chinafile.com/do...

or this:
http://chinadigitaltimes.ne...

The first is a policy document written by a ministerial level (like the US Cabinet) official and signed off on by Mr. Xi. It is not some crackpot that wrote it. The 70 year old woman who leaked it is named Gao Yu, and she got 7 years in prison for it... shortened to house arrest after serving two years.

Since then a law was passed making it illegal for a party member not to publicly support all party policies.

The second link is a list of instructions to the State owned and all other media on what they must say and not say. this list is disseminated every day. If you go to the correct website, you can see new items added in real time. Here is an example: You know Tsai Ing-Wen is the President of Taiwan? Maybe you know a little something about Taiwanese and Cross strait politics?

To All Media: Please delete the Xinhua Online article “Scrutinizing Tsai Ing-wen.” Its wording is inappropriate, and its appearance on media sites is having a bad influence on public opinion. In the immediate future (carry this out first, then wait for notice), all reports touching on the cross-Straits issue must go through responsible media personnel before they are published. (May 25, 2016) [Chinese]

I think I am more sophisticated and even keeled about this than you suspect. One learns a lot in five or six years. I'm no jingoist, you'll just have to take my word for it. But China's government has got a neo totalitarian thing going here. The constitution has been abrogated, (read articles 34-40 for a good laugh) ...the army is the party's army, not the nation's,...the pollution is incredible, and the corruption behind it is profound...you have no idea how far it's gone. it is all about keeping the CCP in power.

Social networks are censored, 15,000 books are banned, much of the west's newspapers are blocked, and these strictures are tightening, not loosening. But difficult to maintain as even middle school kids have VPN's that mostly work although sometimes not. And the wealthy of course have it all worked out.

My city I cannot tell you.
But from part of your comment I think you cannot yet imagine what you don't yet understand. This is not a simple land, nor am I a simple man.

Thanks for the informative and quite extensive read.
It does seem like outsiders don't fully understand the complete extent that the CCP has over everyday life in China. The military pledging fielty to the Communist Party and not the country, always struck me as a relic of the age of Emperors.

The average Chinese citizen living in their semi-open society, sadly, seemingly has the same life as someone living under an overt and all-consuming totalitarian regime. The main goal of everyday is basically keep your head down, concentrate on providing for your family, and don't let others problems become yours. It's the same isolating people while still in a group tactic, that Monarchies, Dictators, and Demagogues have used for centuries to prevent any threat to their rule.

I am decidedly very worried about the instability that the one-party systems inevitable failure will cause. The aging population and pollution will only be ignored by the population at large, as long as the economic prosperity continues unabated, and any deep economic downturn could result in political instability.

What will be even more fascinating will be all those "young" chinese people that don't have kids.
Without risky family ties, they'll have less to lose. And people with not much to lose are harder to control.
It will be an interesting decade.

It is going to be a huge couple decades for China (and Russia) to overcome.
I'm betting if worse come to worse and the economy starts tanking. They will start using the historical grievances ploy(that worked well in the SCS) to unite the public into supporting the regime.
There is already talk starting on their government controlled media about how they have maps and other historical documents, showing they are the rightful heirs to the eastern Siberia region, and its enormous amounts of natural and unpolluted resources . China had started the exact same talk a decade before they made a move and annexed the SCS from its rightful owners.

Russia would have no real means of stopping an invasion before China could consolidate its gains, other than with nuclear weapons. Russia could already be in an internal power struggle when they decide to do it, since the Orthodox Christian Slavs will be outnumbered by the multi-religious minorities in 15-20 years, and drastic demographic changes have always brought political instability.

I agree with those paragraphs.

Relic of Emperors,
totalitarian isolation from establishing non official civic institutions, and
problems ignored as long as economic prosperity continues unabated.