China Faces Worse then US

Misery loves company, but in Andrew Browne's synopsis of China's current set of economic problems [ For Bejing, Policitcal Goals Trump Economics, The Wall Street Journal, 8 March 2016 ] it seems the Chinese have more than their fair share of misery.  They suffer from "colossal industrial overcapacity, soaring corporate debt, plunging profits, declining factory prices. His reluctance to draw blood underscores a critical change that has come over a Chinese leadership that once had a reputation for pursuing economic goals with ruthless pragmatism. Today, politics trumps economics."   What he doesn't add is the current 5-year goal for the economy did not decline to compensate for any of these problems.  This goal is really going to put the squeeze on middle and top managers who will have to produce more with already over capacity production.  People will be jumping off buildings again - except that pragmatism has finally calmed that down.  They don't want a repeat of that time.  

These are mostly things that come from a managed economy, which at times, some people in our own government have pushed for.  It is the "government knows better" syndrome that comes from people in government telling us they can figure out what we should do for ourselves better than we can.  Europe has been trying the same things for centuries longer than US.  People seem to be naturally opposed to this kind of thinking.  The harder the government works to maintain its position, the more likely to be the strains of conflict.  The world is coming to a time when the elected governments are coming under pressure to change rather than maintain that kind of control.  Germany is feeling that heat right now.  

China has the internal mechanisms in its telecommunications infrastructure to keep that under control.  They find, isolate and manage people who don't like the status quo.  When they leave the country, the Chinese government comes and gets them to get them back under that control.  They have a very effective system for keeping a lid on disaffection.  The methods are ruthless.    

We don't, and many of our friends can say the same.  Our disaffected make news every days in political railing in a way that other countries not only don't understand, but don't appreciate either.  When we ask ourselves which system we would rather live under, most will say they want stability and a smooth, efficient government to manage it.  That is what China says too - harmony for all.  

So, the only real difference is how that is enforced.  Democracy is a terrible form of government, but we have to know that it is better than the alternatives.  We might wish for something better, neater and cleaner, but an old Chinese curse says May all your wishes come true.