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Comment by 2stop | Hacker News Reader

So your issue is with poverty, and culture not with infrastructure?

GDP/capita is pretty shitty in china, I agree. Because time/money ratio is so crap, people are prepared to spend time, to save/earn more money, hence toll roads being an issue, and house speculation being an issue.

But no other country has increased GDP/capita faster than china (and on the scale china has) in the history of GDP/capita records.[0]

So exactly what are we criticising?

[0] http://www.gapminder.org/world/#$majorMode=chart$is;shi=t;ly...,

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> Because time/money ratio is so crap, people are prepared to spend time, to save/earn more money, hence toll roads being an issue, and house speculation being an issue.

The point is that infrastructure investments are often misdirected, poorly thought out, or plain corrupt. China needs "affordable" housing, not property as "speculation opportunities" (and given that there are so few ways to invest money, this is what happens anyways). China needs low logistic costs, but has some of the highest in the world even with their "great" infrastructure; toll roads represent great skimming opportunities for officials and their families. Truck drivers are stuck in a crappy situation where they are forced to overload their trucks just to make ends meet, and hope the fines on the way (justified or not) don't bankrupt them.

> So exactly what are we criticising?

We were arguing about whether China's infrastructure investments were wise or not.

> toll roads represent great skimming opportunities for officials and their families

Okay, provide some evidence government officials are 'skimming' from (all) toll roads. That's a pretty big claim, and as far as I can tell, the tolls are either private companies or government run tolls, that isn't corruption, that's taxation and enterprise.

So they don't have affordable housing because they don't allow enough things to invest in?

All truck drivers have to overload their trucks, and hope they don't get fined?

China's a big place, are you sure your statements apply across the whole nation. Or are you pretty much referring to domestic problems in a particular city?

Housing is not affordable in the Bay Area (SF)... is that also because they don't have enough to invest in?

Truck drivers the world over, are over worked, under paid, and have to resort to drugs, over loading, and sleep avoidance to make it... Is that because of corrupt toll road owners?

China has (some) the highest logistic costs in the world? Are you sure about that? Can I see a chart of 'world logistic costs'?

> the tolls are either private companies or government run tolls, that isn't corruption, that's taxation and enterprise.

How do you think business works in China? All of these infrastructure projects are deeply guangxi based, and there is no better guangxi than family (e.g. how all the taxi companies in Beijing are run by official relatives).

> So they don't have affordable housing because they don't allow enough things to invest in?

Most housing is not built for people to live in, its built as investment vehicles for rich people. This is true even in 2nd tier cities, not just the first tier ones. Its a country wide problem that the government is trying to tackle.

> China has (some) the highest logistic costs in the world? Are you sure about that? Can I see a chart of 'world logistic costs'?

About 5X of developed country logistic rates. Sure, India might be higher, but China's "great" infrastructure should have lowered logistic costs to developed country levels, and it it hasn't yet (mainly due to corruption).

[1] http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/business/2012-04/25/content_151...

2stop, you've been hell banned for some reason, not sure why.

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