They aren’t trying to be communist, they are trying to be “Communist with Chinese elements” which is just capitalism. Similar to how they are a “Democracy with Chinese elements” which is just a dictatorship.
Why does China have so many multi billionaires if they are aiming to be a communist country?
Submitted 3 weeks ago by Return_of_Chippy@lemmy.world to [deleted]
https://lemmy.world/pictrs/image/1abde6a3-8484-4d19-857f-ea24b7ec0f77.jpeg
Comments
Racoonwithbenefits@lemmy.zip 3 weeks ago
China is a capitalist country
They focus their government money on creating jobs and control. People will well paying jobs and money for fun stuff are less likely to start a civil war
Rather than the US where the focus is making themselves richer and funding the military
Kolanaki@pawb.social 3 weeks ago
Funding the military so they can quash any rebellions from people having nothing left to lose deciding to rise up.
Formfiller@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
They also basically told us to overthrow the government and rewrite the constitution in our situation
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, -That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.
WoodScientist@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Unfortunately the “no standing army” thing was a product of a certain age. When the fastest an army could move is via sail or a trotting horse, you can get away with not having a standing army. In the months it took your enemy to reach you, you could train and prepare. Standing armies always had some advantage, but it was actually possible to maintain a viable defense without one.
But today? The enemy army will be occupying your capital before you can even send all the draft notices out. Imagine if Ukraine had had no standing army when Russia invaded. And that’s just with how quick ground armies can move. We haven’t even mentioned aircraft and paratroopers!
Sure, there are a handful of countries with no standing army today, but they’re countries that simply don’t need a credible defense. Iceland has no army. But an Iceland without an army would perform in war only slightly worse than an Iceland that was as devoted to war as the historical Spartans. Iceland could tax themselves into oblivion and put every citizen they could in uniform, but they just don’t have the population to credibly deter an invasion by a major power. The only countries without standing armies today are very small countries that, due to their population, are completely dependent on outside allies for their defense.
dreamkeeper@literature.cafe 2 weeks ago
They should’ve banned it in the Constitution then. Though given how bloodthirsty Americans turned out to be, we probably would’ve amended it anyway.
Amnesigenic@lemmy.ml 2 weeks ago
You don’t have a clue what the word capitalism means
Honytawk@discuss.tchncs.de 2 weeks ago
Can you have oligarchs in a communist country?
lechekaflan@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
People will well paying jobs and money for fun stuff are less likely to start a civil war
Depends on what part of Mainland China, as there’s glaring class struggle within. Of course, anyone says otherwise will have Xi quietly sending in riot police.
Objection@lemmy.ml 3 weeks ago
They didn’t used to have billionaires, when Mao was in power. Strangely, a lot of Westerners seem to hate what China is now, but also hate what China was before, which seems very strange to me. “The reforms were bad and China should be more Maoist” that is a coherent position, “The reforms were good but should have gone further and become even more capitalist” that is also a coherent position. But “China is bad now because they allow billionaires but they were also bad when they didn’t allow billionaires” isn’t really coherent, it just seems like knee-jerk opposition to whatever they do or don’t do. Anyone who can’t answer the simple question of whether the reforms were good or bad is ideologically bankrupt.
On the off-chance that you actually want a serious answer to the question, let’s start with some history. Before the revolution, China’s average life expectancy was in the 30’s, it experienced frequent famines, had no access to medicine, and had had similarly awful conditions for literally thousands of years with no improvement for the average person. The revolution brought about huge improvements in life expectancy and the basic necessities of life (with the failure of the Great Leap Forward being an exception to this general trend).
However, while central planning works for providing basic necessities because the demand for those necessities is very predictable, it is not the most efficient regarding consumer goods. This was one of the failures that caused the collapse of the USSR, the desire for consumer good and the inability to compete domestically. Furthermore, despite the increases in life expectancy, virtually everyone in China still lived in extreme poverty. The reforms in the 80s were intended to address this, and they were wildly successful at it:
In the words of Deng, it doesn’t matter if the cat is white or black, so long as it catches mice. It doesn’t really matter if a policy is ideologically “pure,” so long as it provides clear material benefits for the common people.
Where I’m standing, the whole point of having any sort of political beliefs at all is to figure out which policies will improve people’s lives. And lifting 800 million people out of extreme poverty over the span of 40 years, can you name a more successful policy, ever, in all of history?
LH0ezVT@sh.itjust.works 2 weeks ago
I think the position of those people is “Maoism was bad, the reforms were good, but they overcorrected”. Imho a perfectly coherent position as well. Quality of life in modern China is surely better than during the Mao era, and not only because if material wealth, but surely this current state is not perfect. Far from it, if you ask me.
Tiral@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
You mean people don’t like that millions of people starved to death when Mao killed at the intellectuals? Yeah, I could see why people might have a bad view of that.
WoodScientist@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
And yet, China has delivered substantially lower average incomes than its peers. It’s not even close. The people of Taiwan, despite sharing a common cultural and ethnic history as mainland China, enjoy a substantially higher standard of living than their mainland peers.
Yes, they’ve raised hundreds of millions out of poverty, but that’s been the case throughout East Asia. The whole region saw its standard of living dramatically rise as it industrialized. And the capitalist countries have enjoyed far greater economic success than the communist ones.
The absolute number of people is a red herring. Obviously big countries have more people.
I’m hoping you’re not one of those .ml folks that acts like a Republican and calls every source they don’t like “Fake News.” But in case you are, can you provide your own sources? I would be curious on your thoughts of the per-capita incomes of China vs the capitalist East Asian countries. Can you show that China has performed better than them on a per-capita basis?
Objection@lemmy.ml 2 weeks ago
The people of Taiwan, despite sharing a common cultural and ethnic history as mainland China, enjoy a substantially higher standard of living than their mainland peers.
This is a ridiculous comparison. Taiwan received substantial foreign aid from the US because of it’s strategic value against the mainland, while the PRC was subject to a massive economic embargo.
Yes, they’ve raised hundreds of millions out of poverty, but that’s been the case throughout East Asia. The whole region saw its standard of living dramatically rise as it industrialized. And the capitalist countries have enjoyed far greater economic success than the communist ones.
Sorry, which countries are we talking about again? There’s not that many countries in East Asia. Taiwan, South Korea, and Japan all benefited from foreign investment and trade, and again, with much smaller populations.
If you’re going to argue that the embargo on China was an inevitable result of its communist policies, well, that’s a big part of why they did the reforms in the 80’s.
The absolute number of people is a red herring. Obviously big countries have more people.
That… what? I don’t follow what you’re saying here at all.
It’s much easier for a small country to modernize in a short period of time, especially with outside help. It’s very difficult to reach all the people in all the rural areas of China, it means more infrastructure has to be built, more people have to be educated, etc.
I’m hoping you’re not one of those .ml folks that acts like a Republican and calls every source they don’t like “Fake News.” But in case you are, can you provide your own sources?
My source is the extremely biased, far-left communist newsletter known as The World Bank.
I would be curious on your thoughts of the per-capita incomes of China vs the capitalist East Asian countries. Can you show that China has performed better than them on a per-capita basis?
I don’t agree that per-capita is the relevent statistic for the above reasons.
UnequalExchange@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Youre actually completely wrong about extreme poverty AND extreme poverty in China.
Thw World Bank’s definitions of ‘extreme poverty’ are completelt stupid. Thhe World Bank has stated that they consider 1.25USD/day to be ‘extreme poverty’ … who here could live off of 1.25USD /day? Could you live off of that? Even in China? Even in Nigeria you cant live off of that.
ALSO deng’s reforms increased the people in China living beneath the BASICS NEEDS POVERTY LINE which is a much better measure of extreme poverty since the BASIC NEEDS POVERTY LINE or BNPL measures rhe BASIC NEEDS that a person needs
Citations here and in the description of the video : m.youtube.com/watch?v=RStKklOC-Z4&t=926s&pp=ygUqY…
Be better.
drmoose@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
And lifting 800 million people out of extreme poverty over the span of 40 years, can you name a more successful policy, ever, in all of history?
Democracy. I really hate this untestable argument as if we could go back in time and do A|B test to see which framework would have lifted people out of poverty the fastest. Taiwan is richer and more free than China despite being democratic, so is Japan, South Korea - what now? Which dicks do we measure and do we start at the balls or just the shaft?
Objection@lemmy.ml 2 weeks ago
I really hate this untestable argument as if we could go back in time and do A|B test to see which framework would have lifted people out of poverty the fastest.
What?? Then why even discuss anything about anything?
If you’re criticizing China’s policies, surely the point of that criticism is that you think different policies would have been more effective.
It’s also not entirely a counterfactual because we can examine every other political faction that had a reasonable chance of controlling China, and see what their leadership looked like in practice.
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The Nationalists did absolutely nothing to help the rural poor, embezzled foreign aid, and were more preoccupied with hunting down their domestic enemies than repelling the genocidal fascist invaders. Chiang Kai-Shek was literally had to be captured by his own bodyguards to be pressured into defending the country. Life expectancy remained completely flat during his rule.
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The fascist, genocidal Japanese invaders weren’t a good option for obvious reason.
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How about having no centralized authority at all? That’s what they had during the warlord period, a time of chaos and conflict that left the country vulnerable and did nothing to improve things for anyone.
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Before that, there was the Qing dynasty, an authoritarian monarchy which was so assured of its superiority that they completely failed to adapt to foreign innovations and technologies, out of pride, even when it was clear that those technologies were superior.
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Then you have the various European powers, carving the country up to divy up the resources between each other, while getting half the country addicted to opium.
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And, returning to how things played out historically, we have the one and only faction that had any intention whatsoever of helping the hundreds of millions of starving farmers, which doubled life expectancy within a generation and then adapted to changing conditions and enacted policies which, again, brought 800 million people out of extreme poverty.
Taiwan is richer and more free than China despite being democratic, so is Japan, South Korea - what now? Which dicks do we measure and do we start at the balls or just the shaft?
I’m the one trying to avoid this pointless dick-measuring contest between countries with vastly different conditions, despite everyone else trying to draw me into it. I’ve said repeatedly that I don’t know why we’re comparing countries. Why don’t you ask WoodScientist who’s dicks we measure, since he’s the one trying to measure dicks?
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Ingwerperium@thelemmy.club 2 weeks ago
China does not claim to be a fully communist society yet. Official ideology describes the country as being in a long-term developmental phase of socialism; communism is portrayed as a future goal. However, if they continue as they have been treating people like mere numbers, keeping them in poverty under total control, while billionaires amass wealth they will never achieve that anyway. In a society that ideologically advocates for overcoming class distinctions and capitalist exploitation, enormous private fortunes exist. Entrepreneurs like Jack Ma have at times amassed wealth running into the billions. At the same time, the Party controls key sectors of the economy and can exert massive pressure on companies. That transitional phase has gone spectacularly wrong. That is not how communism is defined. Private property is accepted only as long as it remains compatible with the Party’s political interests. This is very convenient for the government: it can harness the productivity and innovation of capitalism without adopting the political power structures of a liberal political system.
Tiral@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Oh Jesus Christ. They’re as communist as you can humanly get currently. I hate this crap where people go “well xyz isn’t full communist”. No country can or will be 100% communist, socialist, or capitalist. It’s basically impossible. They can claim whatever they want. Half the shit they say is made up anyways.
But. they are at communist as possible.
dreamkeeper@literature.cafe 2 weeks ago
No they aren’t. Try actually reading about how their economy works. The whole thing is a scam to keep their form of state capitalism.
raspberriesareyummy@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
But. they are at communist as possible.
Educate yourself. China is de-facto the biggest and most successful capitalist economy on this planet.
Poem_for_your_sprog@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Poop fart and fart poop
lechekaflan@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Their own brand of capitalism is one tied to a penultimate patriotic goal, where all enterprises are convinced by the Party they are working to achieve supremacy by 2049 where by that time, the Mainland topples and humiliates what they see as American hegemony and exceptionalism, while expecting the rest of the world – including developing countries who are now tied to the Mainland through heavy imports – to acknowledge its being figuratively the Middle Kingdom.
This is the China that can say “no”, and a book that once vigorously supported the idea of destroying American hegemony through capitalism and was banned briefly, is now cashing in on the winnings.
febra@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
First and foremost, there’s no such thing as a “communist country”. Communism is a very late stage of socialist development when all class contradictions have been abolished. We don’t know what that might look like, but the consensus is that we can’t really talk about a country being communist but rather an overall state of the world.
Secondly, China has a fairly good grip over its billionaire class. They don’t have the class power their class has in the US, Europe, or the rest of the western capitalist world. The capitalist class in China is subject to the wishes of the working class represented by the party with its over 100 million members.
Return_of_Chippy@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Cope
febra@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
In what way? There’s nothing to cope about
raspberriesareyummy@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
The capitalist class in China is subject to the wishes of the working class represented by the party with its over 100 million members.
LMAO. Do you actually believe that garbage yourself?
The simple truth is that China is the most efficient capitalist country in the world right now - they combine a totalitarian regime with a huge economy and an actual self-serving but smart understanding of capitalism. They are simply better at playing that game that the rest of the world.
What we don’t see from the outside is to what degree becoming rich enables you to take influence on the political system. What we do see is that the Chinese “communist” (muhaha) party has an iron grip on the country, but also that they are strongly intertwined with what you call “the capitalist class” (i.e. rich parasites).
febra@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
an actual self-serving but smart understanding of capitalism
Welcome to marxism-leninism. Socialist state building is about achieving progress for the people. That can mean building up production forces and engaging in capitalism, as long as the capitalist class is subject to the peoples wishes.
Amnesigenic@lemmy.ml 2 weeks ago
Wordy and condescending but does absolutely nothing to prove them wrong, great job!
Hueristic_Autistic@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
100% they have a class based system it’s just not talked about.
They do have a bourgeoisie class and a peasent class.
They have doctors, lawyers, construction workers, government employees, billionaires and unprecedented wealth within families.
TThe the have the rice paddy farmers, the package sorters, the food delivery drivers, the minimum income workers living in cramped apartments and the unemployed.
SpookyBogMonster@lemmy.ml 2 weeks ago
100% they have a class based system it’s just not talked about.
It’s literally on their flag though. Those stars aren’t just decoration, they stand for the peasants, workers, petite bourgeois and national bourgeois, unified and led by the big star: the communist party, and its allies.
China is a people’s republic, which historically would mean that those various class strata would be represented in government, by various parties and mass organizations. Not just a single communist party (see, East Germany, Socialist Poland, or the early DPRK). As China has developed its productive forces, however, a decision was made to allow the Bourgeoisie to be an element within the communist party itself, so they couldn’t form their own separate base of political power. While that brings contradictions, they’re far more manageable than they would be otherwise.
They’re pretty open about all of this.
FlyingCircus@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Yes, that’s why it’s not communist. But it is socialist, because the working class controls the government and holds the reins of the economy.
Itdidnttrickledown@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
Cos playing at communism at best. China is a totalitarian fascist state.
Amnesigenic@lemmy.ml 2 weeks ago
Words mean things, try looking them up before using them in sentences
Strawberry@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 weeks ago
So much ignorance on display here in this thread. People talking out of their ass with no clue or care why and how China has implemented economic reforms and development policy. No clue what communists even are much less the details of how they manage the economy of a developing socialist state within a capitalist global economy. Just thought-terminating clichés about billionaires and so-called “state capitalism”.
Fun fact: you can actually read the justifications for why socialist countries managed by proletariat governments have implemented limited market systems in their economies in China, Vietnam, Cuba, USSR, even Korea. Their thoughts are public!
UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
I might go one further and suggest this is why the “Just tax the billionaires” line never actually delivers the goods. It’s a classic Belling-The-Cat problem, because its very easy to say “Tax the Billionaires” but its very difficult to move forward with a policy that does the actual thing, without billionaires pooling their resources to prevent you from accessing any of the levers of power.
You need a certain collectivist worldview to even attempt the problem of regulating and sanctioning a bourgeois class. And when you’re brainwashed by some combination of out-of-context Adam Smith quotes and reskinned Milton Friedman / Ayn Rand videos, good fucking luck.
Fun fact: you can actually read the justifications for why socialist countries managed by proletariat governments have implemented limited market systems in their economies in China, Vietnam, Cuba, USSR, even Korea. Their thoughts are public!
If you know where to look and you trust the source material and you’ve got the patience to work through the finer details, sure.
But that’s the sort of learning you typically need to tackle in grade school if you want it to stick. Open minds and lots of free time are necessary to get this kind of rigorous political education. By the time you’ve had your head crammed full of cable news fearmongering and employer-sponsored propaganda, you’ll be allergic to the very idea of taking a book like Fanshen or The Bolivian Diary at face value.
Return_of_Chippy@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
What do you mean?
AlfalFaFail@lemmy.ml 2 weeks ago
Instead of using the term good, I think the standard here is asking, “Do the billionaires have more power than the some other group? In this cases CPC.” And if the CPC has more power, “What role does the CPC imagine using the billionaires to development of society and the party goals?”
Strawberry@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 weeks ago
China did not press a magical “make billionaires from clay” button. It enacted market reforms, after the failure in leaping directly from a largely feudal economy to a collectivist one, to progress the development of its economy within the global capitalist market system. Billionaires are an unfortunate symptom of the condradictions inherent to this system. Unlike most countries, however, the chinese government recognizes these billionaires as the threat to the public that they are, and tends to be much more cautious about them as a result, resisting their influence in state affairs.
Amnesigenic@lemmy.ml 2 weeks ago
Are you an actual child? Serious answers only please
Dearth@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
I think the billionaires are just a symptom of the capitalist global economy. China uses the wealth generated by the billionaires to further their goals of working towards communism.
MisterFrog@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
I somewhat echo you feelings on ignorance and “China bad!”, but definitely do not agree with the characterisation of China as a “proletariat government”.
The workers do not have meaningful democratic control over society in China, and to claim they do requires some next-level mental gymnastics.
If one believes in control of society by the workers, as socialists ought to by definition (at least, by my understanding), one really ought not tout China as a government to emulate…
abbiistabbii@piefed.blahaj.zone 3 weeks ago
Because “Communist States” are just State Capitalism with red branding, next question.
Return_of_Chippy@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
Why does my girlfriend call all the food I make slop.
abbiistabbii@piefed.blahaj.zone 3 weeks ago
Maybe improve your cooking?
Valmond@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 weeks ago
Have you checked you’re not a dog?
djsiete@sh.itjust.works 2 weeks ago
Worry about your own country, yank
Lumisal@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
They’re both bad. China is full of pollution issues (though admittedly making progress), global blackmail (well mostly Africa) and terrible (virtually non-existent?) privacy. And a totalitarian capitalist state.
USA is an Idiocracy also full of pollution issues, mind numbing idiocy, and a declining imperialist empire full of (and I really can’t emphasize how many) idiots that’s a cancer spreading fascism and oligarchy.
Finland is, well, here. The Prime Minister did some corruption with an ice hockey stadium, but that’s recent and we’re waiting to see if he’ll be jailed. If he isn’t, we’ll be joining the ranks of corrupt capitalistic oligarchies I suppose, but we’ve had an okayish track record so far. Never invaded other countries (USA and to a much lesser extent, China) or tried to annihilate others (Taiwan).
KatakiY@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Not a chin defender typically but why is what China is doing in africa black mail? Especially in comparison to traditional banking loans used to leverage natural resources away from africa?
djsiete@sh.itjust.works 2 weeks ago
If China is a 10 on badness scale, then the US is at 10000000. I won’t tolerate people even talking about the two as equals.
Return_of_Chippy@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
What do you mean?
roguetrick@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
Ask Jack Ma what being a billionaire in China is worth.
Quokka@quokk.au 3 weeks ago
It’s worth $30 billion.
Being humbled by the state while remaining a billionaire does not justify the existence of the billionaire capitalist class.
Return_of_Chippy@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
Well yeah, he criticized a government labeled “communist”. He’s lucky to be alive. But, he’s still a billionaire and has homes in like a dozen countries.
roguetrick@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
I’m just trying to connect your reasoning here. Are you implying that billionaires should be brought to heel by popular power or private property should be respected? Do you believe property is an essential right that should give you a megaphone or not? I’m just saying billionaires don’t particularly laugh at Chinese state directives as in the meme.
Amnesigenic@lemmy.ml 2 weeks ago
China has maintained enough of a market system to avoid our usual direct efforts at overthrow or embargo, as long as our billionaire ruling class sees their markets as an opportunity outweighing the threat of their government they’ll block any push by our government to interfere with their access to those markets. Not only did that work perfectly but they actually managed to get their greatest global rival to voluntarily de-industrialize and hand the vast majority of our productive capacity over to them without a single shot fired. Every last bit of argument here and elsewhere about whether they’re communist or not is just cope from people whose civilizations have never pulled off anything half that slick in their entire worthless existences
Return_of_Chippy@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
They do have famously good working conditions, high wages and quality of life.
UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Their working class is in a meat grinder to an extent I haven’t seen anywhere else.
Then you really haven’t looked. Chinese working people have paid vacation and sick leave, low-cost public housing in abundance with nearly 90% of the population owning a primary residence, and retirement in the 50s for women and 60s for men. Per-capita debt is about 10% of the American population. The adult literacy rate is 98%, 20-pts higher than their American peers. Life expectancy is eclipsing the US, as theirs rises and ours falls. Instances of suicide are much lower. Incarceration rates are lower. Yadda yadda yadda.
Now compare the Chinese working class to folks living in The Philippines or Pakistan or South Africa or Brazil. Nevermind Egypt or Russia or Qatar or - god forbid - Haiti or Palestine. It’s not even close.
Alcoholicorn@mander.xyz 2 weeks ago
Their working class is in a meat grinder to an extent I haven’t seen anywhere else
You’ve never been to a global south country I take it?
China has a lot further to go to reach parity with the first world, but its nowhere near as bad as it was even 20 years ago when you could see videos of children working inside machine presses.
Treczoks@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Imagine living in Lebanon and not being a millionaire…
Even normal people there live in houses worth billions of Lebanese Pounds.
Oppopity@lemmy.ml 3 weeks ago
Because they’re marxist leninist and think socialism is something you work towards and isn’t achievable by pressing the big red communism button.
Quokka@quokk.au 3 weeks ago
Just a few more billionaires and the state will wither away.
Leviathan@fedinsfw.app 3 weeks ago
Tankies are the greatest right-wing propaganda that lefties still fall for both by believing in it and by believing that it’s actually coming from sincere leftists.
mattyroses@lemmy.today 2 weeks ago
define “tankie”
ivanafterall@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Yeah, I think the U.S. is going to naturally pull back to the left, but I fear it will still go poorly, because we’re still very stupid people and it will be exploited by bad-faith actors just like everything else. But I hope I’m just overly cynical. I don’t think I am though.
ZkhqrD5o@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
IMHO China is a more capitalist country than the USA. 12h workdays 6 days a week (996), with overtime 16h, no labour rights, no representation, only the party gets that. Flooding the markets with goods sold at a loss, to drive the other countries’ industry out of business. The taxpayer subsideses the loss. And once China is the monopoly, they can charge what they want.
IMO these MAGA cunts should wet themselves at the sight of China. After all, China is more capitalist than the USA, lol.
plyth@feddit.org 2 weeks ago
IMHO China is a more capitalist country than the USA. 12h workdays 6 days a week
Communism doesn’t mean that everybody can slack off. If people don’t work enough it’s difficult for them to catch up with Capitalism, like USSR and Eastern Europe have shown.
All that work has paid off for China. Unlike any other country they have a shot at being independent from the West.
Capitalism means that the people who control the means of production also control politics. That’s not true in China, so that people there can hope for a better life despite AI and robots.
DoucheBagMcSwag@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 weeks ago
That’s because China is not Communist and only “communist” on paper so that the people can still believe in the “trickle down” economics where “the people” own a share of the business
They do not.
djsiete@sh.itjust.works 2 weeks ago
Still prefer that to the hellhole that is the US
someone@lemmy.today 2 weeks ago
China’s restrictions on free speech scare me… and I don’t like all their policies… at all…
but, in China’s defense…
Many countries that have tried to implement communism have been overthrown… and so if China is trying to position itself in a technologically dominant way to avoid being overthrown, embracing some limited capitalism to foster technological dominance may make sense. If you look at China, they make a lot of great tech and they are really excelling at robotics.
If someone is really good at making money, they sometimes use that capital to create more companies or push technological development further. So it may be a thought out policy choice to allow limited capitalism, even resulting in billionaires, so as to gain technological dominance, so as to not be overthrown?
BeardededSquidward@lemmy.blahaj.zone 3 weeks ago
China has stopped being communist for a while now, it’s developed into some flavour of capitalist society though I don’t remember much about the different variants. It’s certainly top heavy though like the USA.
ILikeBoobies@lemmy.ca 3 weeks ago
They’re a capitalist country.
technocrit@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 weeks ago
if they are aiming to be a communist country?
lol
wraekscadu@vargar.org 3 weeks ago
- Nono you see they’re people’s billionaires.
- They’re all patriots with the goal of achieving communism. It’s just that to transition to communism, we need billionaires first.
- The imperialists have billionaires. To defend against these imperialists, we need our own billionaires.
- China is 3000 years old. China survived without your help. We don’t need you to tell us where we can improve. Improve yourself.
- Each country has its own material conditions. This is why we need socialism with Chinese characteristics for China. These Chinese characteristics mean billionaires. Don’t you understand dumm librul?
Big fat /s.
fisch@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
We don’t need donations, we just need to tax them at the same level we’re taxing regular workers. And since their fortunes are growing at double digit rates, a small annual wealth tax wouldn’t hurt them either.
nitroemdash@lemmy.wtf 2 weeks ago
The net worth of the world’s billionaires is over $16 trillion in 2025¹. 1% being 160 billion. On average, around every 4000 USD send to the most effective charity saves someone’s life². So around 40 million children.
This doesn’t account, of course, for the difficulty of selling large amounts of stocks without them losing value and the fact that, as low-hanging dangers are depleting, each subsequent child would be more costly to save.
¹ Wikipedia contributors. (2026, August 3). The World’s Billionaires. In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved 18:47, August 11, 2026, from en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=The_World's_Bi…
² GiveWell. (2026, February). How Much Does It Cost To Save a Life? givewell.org/how-much-does-it-cost-to-save-a-life
Naive@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
This makes me wonder too. A lot of communists I met idolize China but China does not seem to me a communist country now.
Goldmage263@sh.itjust.works 3 weeks ago
Maybe the real shitpost was the comments we made along the way.
Puddinghelmet@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Imo there should be a law that limits the sum total of assets everyone is allowed to have, say 1M-10M
bookcover@lemmy.ml 2 weeks ago
China is communist. It is a government-controlled capitalist. But the government still has the majority of control
nightwatch_admin@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
You were tickling my fancy until I noticed the community. Well done, dear Lemming, well done.
BlackLaZoR@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Because communism never was about equality. It was always about the iron boot in your face.
spittingimage@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
Same reason the US has the most prisons even though it’s aiming to be the freest country.
Return_of_Chippy@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
Systemic racism to control minorities?
Aceticon@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 weeks ago
It was always from the very start meant to maximized the freedom of the Landed classes, nobody else.
mattyroses@lemmy.today 2 weeks ago
gotta ensure that reserve army of labor, otherwise how the capitalists gonna keep profit?
Valmond@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 weeks ago
Don’t make me tap the sign.
The sign: “Whatabout the USA”
technocrit@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 weeks ago
lol