Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Children of the Yuan Percent: Everyone Hates China's Rich Kids

bloomberg.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

131–140 of 179 posts

Re: Children of the Yuan Percent: Everyone Hates China's Rich Kids

#131

Post by blazespin »

DubiousPusher wrote: post #108
blazespin wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

TBH, if you can accept a lower standard of living, few people really need to work that much - at least in developed nations. Most people work for social pride and connection to the community. Which is a good reason. I just wish we could remake how to generate this social pride. Buying a nice car or nice house shouldn't be a reason to feel proud. Teaching, doing or learning something new and useful for your community…

That's horse shit. I work because if I don't I have nothing. I bought a nice house because I like living in a nice house, not for pride. I have a nice car because I enjoy riding in a nice car and was tired of the stress and panic created by having to get my car running by Monday every other weekend. When you're poor, even in developed nations, that poverty is an axe blade hanging by a thread just over your head.

No, that's simply not true. And thanks to Obamacare, not even true in the US anymore. One caveat of course, is this assumes you don't have dependents. That's obviously a completely different problem.

I'm glad you like your standard of living btw. Completely unnecessary of course, but hey, whatever floats your boat.

Re: Children of the Yuan Percent: Everyone Hates China's Rich Kids

#132

Post by blazespin »

timwaagh wrote: post #12
blazespin wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

TBH, if you can accept a lower standard of living, few people really need to work that much - at least in developed nations. Most people work for social pride and connection to the community. Which is a good reason. I just wish we could remake how to generate this social pride. Buying a nice car or nice house shouldn't be a reason to feel proud. Teaching, doing or learning something new and useful for your community…

most people i know do need to work if they dont want to sleep in the streets. i program others wait tables or clean out the garbage. you think somebody does that for 'pride'? it does not matter if the country is developed or not you still have to work because real estate is expensive even if food is not. if you dont well congrats but then you (and your buddies) are one of these second generation dandies.

Oh, I dunno. I have friends who live on old boats tied to mooring buoys - free of charge! They fish for a lot of their meals. They do just fine. They work a little bit around the docks, but not that much. I know other folks who live in nice, clean trailer parks. They work a little bit more, but again, not that much. If you're willing to accept a lower standard of living, there are lots of options. I remember this article about a guy living in his van. Why not? All you need is a low crime area and a place to sleep. Didn't some guy at Google live in an RV at the parking lot?

When I was 19, I was paying around 50 bux a month in a shared accommodations situation. I did bartending/odd jobs about once a week and just bummed around the rest of the time.

When I was 20, I did a part time waiter gig. I ate all my meals for free! Boy, I ate well. I had my own apartment though. It was utterly unnecessary, of course, but I didn't know better.

Honestly, if you look around, these people exist. They are on the fringe but they do just fine. We generally call them 'bums', but you know, that's just envy talking.

Re: Children of the Yuan Percent: Everyone Hates China's Rich Kids

#133

Post by Sven7 »

guelo wrote: post #69
roymurdock wrote: post #31

Funny to think that China was reforged under communist ideals only 50 years ago, and that the hatred of the poor rural folk for the wealthy, corrupt royals and warlords was strong enough to unite allow the country to expel the Japanese, the British, and the KMT. It's my view that the standard of living for the poor and lower classes has improved enough that there would not be enough hatred to fuel a revolution. Disgu…

With the advent of consumerism, high-tech mass surveillance, and control of mass communication channels I think China has reached what political scientists refer to as "the end of history". Meaning that society will stay stable and no revolutions will be possible. At least for a few hundred years.

Agree. What's interesting is the number of comments around here expecting the sky to fall.

Re: Children of the Yuan Percent: Everyone Hates China's Rich Kids

#134

Post by joeyo »

rcarrigan87 wrote: post #11

Further down in the article, some interesting points about the motivations behind philanthropy. "philanthropy is about more than just social responsibility—it’s about social stability." So other than a genuine desire to do good or vanity seeking that can motivate philanthropy, you have a third element in China - preventing a revolt by the poor on the rich. If you give just enough, you'll keep the poor subdued. I wond…

The (slightly cynical) argument could be made that the concessions made by capital to labor in the United States in the early 20th century were to prevent revolts (of the sort that happened in Europe and elsewhere) and especially to reduce the chance a Communist Revolution taking hold. I note that that era was marked by significant industrialist philanthropy as well.

Re: Children of the Yuan Percent: Everyone Hates China's Rich Kids

#135

Post by codyb »

slg wrote: post #123
codyb wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And it looks (at least in Saudi Arabia's case) that they were trying to diversify towards renewables in a vast way [0], although my google search also turned up more recent articles indicating they're pushing that back [1]. The thing about the Saudi Arabian royal family is that they're all guaranteed allowances and the family grows at a near exponential rate since they all have multiple wives. I couldn't find any goo…

Renewables are great, but I'm not sure they would be able to support an entire economy. One of the few great things about fossil fuels and specifically oil is that it is a power source that can be stored in a dense and stable form. Renewables can't really be stored in this manner and therefore can't easily be exported beyond reasonably short distances. Saudi Arabia therefore can't rely on selling renewable energy to…

I was thinking more become a key developer of solar panels and export the panels themselves (or wind turbine blades, geothermal pipes, etc (off the cuff examples, I don't know if they have use or desire for blades or pipes)).

Re: Children of the Yuan Percent: Everyone Hates China's Rich Kids

#136

Post by blazespin »

aianus wrote: post #125
iamcurious wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What stops said Vietnamese for working the same 5 hours a month remotely?

Nothing, if they spoke English and had programming skills. But that's not a small if.

And not just english, but they have to communicate well, be on the right time zone, and understand the culture as well. It's a very very rare find.

Re: Children of the Yuan Percent: Everyone Hates China's Rich Kids

#137

Post by crpatino »

iamcurious wrote: post #115
aianus wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You could program 5 hours a month remotely and make more than a university graduate working full-time in Vietnam. So yeah, the vast, vast majority of U.S. programmers are ultimately doing it out of reasons other than survival, whether they realize it or not.

What stops said Vietnamese for working the same 5 hours a month remotely?

Mostly, that it's not worth your bosses' time to micromanage you if they are going to extract merely 5 hrs/month worth of labor out of you.

But nothing prevents you from working 50 hrs/week for one decade and then retire early, move to Vietnam, and live from your savings.

Re: Children of the Yuan Percent: Everyone Hates China's Rich Kids

#138

Post by dreamfactory2 »

vijayr wrote: post #15
rcarrigan87 wrote: post #11

Further down in the article, some interesting points about the motivations behind philanthropy. "philanthropy is about more than just social responsibility—it’s about social stability." So other than a genuine desire to do good or vanity seeking that can motivate philanthropy, you have a third element in China - preventing a revolt by the poor on the rich. If you give just enough, you'll keep the poor subdued. I wond…

If you give just enough, you'll keep the poor subdued. One could say the same about salaried employees - give them enough to stay. Too little - they revolt or leave, too much - they save the money and still leave after they've saved enough

Nobody in their right mind saves with current interest rates and cheap credit combined with consumerism keeps enough people in hock across the income spectrum

Re: Children of the Yuan Percent: Everyone Hates China's Rich Kids

#139

Post by TACIXAT »

ZeroGravitas wrote: post #35
EliRivers wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a bit out of context. The full quote radically changes the meaning: "There are two groups of poor people. One is, you don’t work hard. You deserve to be poor because you don’t work hard. Second is, you work hard but can’t succeed. I think we should help the second group of people."

I liked her next line: There’s a saying, jiu ji bu jiu pin —‘We’ll help you if you have an emergency, but we cannot help you if you’re poor.’ Which is something I think about every time there's a global appeal after an earthquake or tidal wave, yet that contrasts with general indifference or outright hostility to helping with general poverty. Just need to figure out how to pronounce that phrase correctly so I can dro…

I had some trouble finding the characters for that, so in case anyone else is curious -

救急不救贫。

My non-expert analysis, emergency is the characters jiu4ji2. The character jiu4 is save, ji2 is urgent, so save+urgent = emergency. The character bu4 is no, negative, not. The next two characters are jiu4 (save, from before) and pin2 (poor). These don't combine as a single word and are read separately.

With all that in mind, I read it as "It's save+urgent, not save poor". Interesting play on words.

Re: Children of the Yuan Percent: Everyone Hates China's Rich Kids

#140

Post by raverbashing »

lordnacho wrote: post #42
raverbashing wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Probably also absurdly spoiled, never had to have an actual 9-5 job Also accustomed to being rude and being pampered all around the place

No, I never saw any rudeness from either of these fellows. And they never showed up with a bunch of servants, even though they could hire a whole army of them. The one guy is doing an ordinary 9-5 job. Other guy is managing his family fortune, so yes that's not a normal job.

I am glad your experiences did not match mine
Post reply on HN