Chinese Are Anxious About Economic Future, But Theirs May Not Be So Bad

choi

(1) Fred Hiatt, The Chinese Are Anxious Over the Future. Washington Post, Nov 3, 2013.
www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/ ... 898f2dbc_story.html

Quote: "What I’m talking about [in this visit to Beijing] is a deeper-seated anxiety about navigating the next stages of growth. In interviews and informal conversations organized for me and three other journalists by the Committee of 100, a US nonprofit dedicated to US-China mutual understanding, two themes emerged. 'The easy part is over' was one. The second was: the next stages of economic reform will depend on political reform that the Communist Party may not be willing or able to deliver.

(2)
(a) Now I finally get it. Before I could not fathom why people outside China--not me--worry about China's economic future.
(b) We are all Keynesians now
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/We_are_all_Keynesians_now

Milton Friedman was an opponent of John Maynard Keynes, who favored interventionist policy in economics.
(c) Having been in US for almost three decades, I subscribe to Mr Friedman's views, having been freed from the dogma held in Taiwan and Japan, which dictated the government knew the best and led and guided the nation--economically or otherwise. My view is a government should not stand in the way. So Chinese and Taiwanese are wrong to pin their hopes on their respective government.
(d) Further, China is part of world-wide trend, that BRICS are down on their luck in the past two years. See

Tom Wright, Emerging Markets' Pivot Point. Wall Street Journal, Nov 4, 2013.
http://online.barrons.com/articl ... 71401793472142.html

three consecutive paragraphs:

"But two years ago, the picture began to change. Growth has fallen sharply in emerging markets—by three percentage points since 2010 to 5% on an annualized quarterly basis, according to the International Monetary Fund.

"Now, the question is what caused this drop and whether these lower rates of expansion are the new normal or just a rest stop on the developing world's march to catch up with industrialized countries.

"The growth debate hinges on whether the dip is due to structural problems and thus permanent or the result of a temporary downturn in the globe's economic cycle.


My comment: There is no need to read the rest, for there is no answer in the article--or in the real world, either.