Is China's economy larger than the American economy?

[eridani]

http://www.nationofchange.org/united-states-number-2-1333892242

A new study that carefully examined China’s prices and consumption patterns concluded that it is far wealthier than the widely used data indicate. According to this study, China’s economy may already be as much as 20 percent larger than the U.S. economy. Furthermore, even if its growth rate slows to the 7.0 percent annual rate that many now expect, China’s economy may be close to twice the size of the U.S. economy in the span of a decade.

This raises all sorts of interesting questions about the future of the U.S. and China in international relations. Regardless of whether or not China’s economy is bigger than the U.S. economy, it clearly does not exercise anywhere near as much influence internationally. China’s leaders have been content to let the U.S. continue to play the leading role in international bodies and in dealing with international conflicts, intervening only where it felt important interests were threatened.

<snip>

The growing power of China has already increased the options available to many countries in the developing world. Since China can provide far greater amounts of capital than the IMF, World Bank, and other U.S.-dominated institutions, it provides developing countries with an important alternative. They need not adopt policies to appease these institutions to weather economic storms.

One area in which China’s policy can have an enormous impact is intellectual property. The rules on patents and copyrights that the United States has sought to impose on the rest of the world are incredibly wasteful. This is most apparent in prescription drugs, where patent monopolies allow companies to charge hundreds or even thousands of dollars for drugs that would sell for $5-$10 in a free market.

[fasttense]

1. China offers FREE college to its young people.

"The number of people graduating college each year with degrees in science and engineering far exceeds the number in the United States."

That alone will ensure a better future for the people of the communist totalitarian nation.

[Yo_Mama]

9. No it doesn't

Most of them pay.

http://helenhwang.net/2010/03/chinas_problematic_education/

In addition, education has become very expensive. Before 1996, the state provided free college education. Since then, college education has been commercialized. College tuition has soared 25 times over the past 15 years. If living expenses are included, the average cost for a college student is about 40,000 yuan ($5,800) per year. The annual per capita income for rural Chinese, however, is less than 3,000 yuan ($460). Many rural youths simply cannot afford a college education.

For those who go to college, the future does not necessarily look any rosier. In recent years, more than one million college graduates cannot find jobs, including many with master’s degrees and Ph.Ds. Liu Xueshan, a civil engineer in Chongqing, told me that when he graduated from college six years before, it was very easy for him to find a job that paid about 3,000 yuan ($450) per month. Now, college graduates are taking jobs with monthly salaries as low as 1,000 yuan ($150), about the same amount that rural migrants earn without a college education.

For that matter, most Chinese parents have to pay for their kids to attend public high schools - education is only free up to about 15, and after that the families pay a fee, usually pretty moderate.
http://chineseculture.about.com/od/thechineselanguage/a/Introduction-To-Education-In-China.htm

But China also has a system of internal illegal immigration. Many of the laborers and factory workers in cities are not legally there. Because they don't have residence permits, their children have not generally been able to enter the public school system. They usually try to pay a small fee to send their children to an unofficial school to get some education, but it may end quite early. Also these workers don't get unemployment, etc.

China isn't really a communist country - it's a hypercapitalist country with a statist political culture. Because of the new labor shortages, hopefully these workers are going to get a better deal. Some of them live in slum-like conditions, and in some cases in ghetto-type areas.
http://www.beijingshots.com/2012/03/std-exposes-plight-of-migrant-children/

http://hrichina.org/sites/default/files/oldsite/PDFs/Reports/HRIC-Migrants.pdf

China says it is going to improve the situation and give these workers more rights, but it has said so in the past and even passed laws, but they are not enforced.

[DonCoquixote]

2. Yes

But as much as people will cheer the end of Uncle Sam, China will make them long for the old days. We are still talking about a nation that is very suppresive of it's people, and which has no problem dehumanizing large amounts, even if they are well educated. Educated does not mean much in a work camp.

[mbperrin]

7. Doesn't mean much to millions of Americans with degrees, huge student debt,

and no jobs, either.

Work camps mean people have work and are fed. In Texas alone, we have 1.2 million kids with no health insurance, public or private, and they are not receiving the care they need.

Slaves have to be fed and cared for: they are an expensive asset. Wage workers can simply be discarded with no penalty to the discarder at all.

Why is our economy smaller than China's? Too much treasure invested in war, which is a complete waste, rather than infrastructure, education, housing, and public transportation, as well as alternative energies. All empires fail, because empires do not pay, they cost. They never recover, either. There's no second Roman or Greek or British empire, for instance.

This country has been committing suicide since Korea, when profits of war, rather than winning a war, became the ideal. Paper profits are just that - paper. REAL investment is real things. Stupidity, jingoism, short-sighted greed, corporate welfare - these are the epitaph for this country.

[Egalitarian Thug]

3. Our problem as relates to this is that we are stuck in a 19th century worldview.

Some of the 19th century ideas that Americans believe that are not true include;
We must defend ourselves against the invading hordes.
Might makes right.
There is not enough for everybody.
A person must spend a majority of their life to scratch out an existence.
There is no social contract (nobody owes you anything).
That a 12th century banking model is the best way to control currency.
That "they" must be controlled, or chaos will ensue.
It is better to be feared than loved.
Being rich indicates superiority.
Education, justice, and health care are privileges.
Everything beyond subsistence is a luxury.

There's a start.

Almost forgot the most important one;
Government is separate from the people.

[eridani]

4. So are the Chinese, except they are investing in science and engineering n/t

[Egalitarian Thug]

12. That's the Chinese problem, not ours. We can not compete with China in this same old game.

We have to create a new game based on the new reality that (mostly) we created. Investing in science is vitally important and emphasizing education is a great part of that, but again, the old paradigm is no longer applicable. As a the only species with the capacity for self direction, we have to grow up, face what we've made, and shed the old ideas that are no longer applicable so that we can move forward.

[Boojatta]

10. "That a 12th century banking model is the best way to control currency."

Can you quote somebody who made that claim?

[Egalitarian Thug]

11. Where do you think the FRBS system came from? Unless I'm missing the question.

A whole bunch of schemes and scams have been piled on top of it, but that is what it is at its heart.

[bemildred]

5. Is having the biggest really the goal we want to pursue? nt

[eridani]

6. Cutting back on energy and raw materials throughput is not the same thing--

--as cutting back on economic activity.

[bemildred]

8. True, it kind of depends on what you make big.

But the real world limits are quite, well, real. And of course, that's where the issue lies.

One might think it well from the viewpoint of efficiency and stability to minimize our use of non-renewables, but the profit-must-grow view demands that we burn through things as fast as possible.