Good summary by everyone above...China does many impressive things but examples like this are also possible due to lack of oversight, lack of regulation, and corruption (obviously the 'correct' level of oversight and regulation is a struggle in many countries, USA included).

My most recent stay in Beijing (20th floor of a hotel/condo building) seemed wonderful (all things considered) until I discovered an oddity one day. My door had no way to disable the door lock from the inside except by key. It took a minute for the implications of this to dawn on me (hint: there is a fire, you can't find your keys, and you like to keep your door locked). Took about 5 weeks before I even noticed the issue (one day I went to leave the apartment and couldn't find my keys and I went to talk to the front desk and realized I couldn't leave the suite).