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Soviet Collapse Echoes in China’s Belt and Road

bloomberg.com

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Re: Soviet Collapse Echoes in China’s Belt and Road

#121

Post by rtpg »

sonnyblarney wrote: post #118
danmaz74 wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Were actual, material numbers to have been objectively published, we wouldn't have had a crisis in 2008, because nobody would have bought bundles of crap, and the market would have needed no correction because it wouldn't have gotten out of hand. This is circular reasoning. The market works on the information that is available at a given time, which includes all the fudging of numbers that salespeople and marketers…

No, it's not circular logic. Lying to the public, to the government, false reporting is illegal, and against a lot of other controls and regulations that are in place to support a healthy free market. There is a lot of information that does not have to be made public and people can do as they please with it - but this was not the cause of 2008, for the most part.

Maybe a bit tangential, but do you feel if regulatory bodies were given more power to execute on already existing laws and to investigate this kind of fraud, we could prevent 2008-style crises in general?

Re: Soviet Collapse Echoes in China’s Belt and Road

#122

Post by beerlord »

yostrovs wrote: post #49
duxup wrote: post #38

>In the 1950s, the Soviet economy grew faster than that of any other major country barring Japan. I'd like to read more about what was happening then, was it largely military investment?

So much destruction post 1940s coupled with slave labor (local political prisoners and German prisoners of war) leads to roads and steel plants being built quickly. The population though lived on near nothing till the 60s.

Plus a lot of technology, scientists and engineers taken from Germany. For example the AK-series of rifles were in 'production hell' until the Russians put the captured Germans responsible for producing the STG-44 onto the task.

Much of the productive capital assets in Germany were simply lifted up and taken into the Soviet Union.

Re: Soviet Collapse Echoes in China’s Belt and Road

#123

Post by varjag »

gspetr wrote: post #91
yostrovs wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So much destruction post 1940s coupled with slave labor (local political prisoners and German prisoners of war) leads to roads and steel plants being built quickly. The population though lived on near nothing till the 60s.

A not well-researched viewpoint. In USSR since late 20s, a significant portion of workforce was compensated on a "per unit of goods produced" basis, not "per hour worked", which was the standard in contemporary capitalist countries. Slave labor in the post-renaissance era cannot compete with other types of labor. If it could then the South would have fared much better in the US Civil War and everyone and their grandm…

Incorrect. Farmers were closer to slave labour and paid in "work-days", which could be accounted for handouts by administration. Farmers had no freedom of movement outside their farm territories. Life in Soviet villages was largely subsistence based. Slavery for farmers was abolished in 1974 when they were issued domestic passports (the primary ID in USSR) just like townspeople.

As for countless prisoners, they were working for survival with no compensation.

Re: Soviet Collapse Echoes in China’s Belt and Road

#124

Post by close04 »

tobias3 wrote: post #119
close04 wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What was Bloomberg's (FT, Economist, the general economists' consensus, whichever) position in the year before the 2008 crisis? How many times did they flag the impending burst? Every media outlet has an undisclosed interest somewhere or at the very least a heavy bias sometimes. And it's highlighted more than ever when those trusted pillars of reporting like Bloomberg, FT, or the Economist come up with conflicting in…

The economist had e.g. a leader like this: https://www.economist.com/leaders/2005/06/16/after-the-fall It is possible to call bubbles, especially if they are as large and data is transparently available. It is really hard to tell the moment when it will pop, especially if it is connected with the government like in the soviet union or in China.

I'm not arguing the possibility of seeing them but whether you visibly flag them or not. A bad prediction might turn into a self fulfilling prophecy. At the very least it could make a dent in the people's trust. You do this on an election year and you'll pay for it. You might get the shaft regardless if your prediction makes someone powerful look bad.

So when you're playing close to home positive stuff gets the fanfare, negative predictions are underplayed. You're talking about your own market after all. Why do you think it's so easy for these publications to hit at anything that's not domestic? The further away, the less friendly the player, the more scathing the prediction.

Re: Soviet Collapse Echoes in China’s Belt and Road

#125

Post by orf »

rgbrenner wrote: post #24
ilikehurdles wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yep, you have to employ a lot of people to maintain military occupations in an ever-growing list of countries. Clearly we should cut benefits.

We could cut the size of the military... but simply making the observation that we have a large number of people doesn't explain anything. China's military is 2x the size of the US by number of people. It certainly doesn't follow that the richer and more valuable a country becomes (and therefore more expensive personnel), the smaller their military should be.

> China's military is 2x the size of the US by number of people.

And yet china has ~4.5x the number of people as the US.

Re: Soviet Collapse Echoes in China’s Belt and Road

#126

Post by danmaz74 »

sonnyblarney wrote: post #118
danmaz74 wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Were actual, material numbers to have been objectively published, we wouldn't have had a crisis in 2008, because nobody would have bought bundles of crap, and the market would have needed no correction because it wouldn't have gotten out of hand. This is circular reasoning. The market works on the information that is available at a given time, which includes all the fudging of numbers that salespeople and marketers…

No, it's not circular logic. Lying to the public, to the government, false reporting is illegal, and against a lot of other controls and regulations that are in place to support a healthy free market. There is a lot of information that does not have to be made public and people can do as they please with it - but this was not the cause of 2008, for the most part.

Yes, it's illegal, but it's part of every real market that has ever existed, and will ever exist. The circular logic IMHO is in thinking that the market can prevent this by itself, without having to go through corrections like we had in 2008.

Re: Soviet Collapse Echoes in China’s Belt and Road

#127

Post by sonnyblarney »

sonnyblarney wrote: post #118
danmaz74 wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Were actual, material numbers to have been objectively published, we wouldn't have had a crisis in 2008, because nobody would have bought bundles of crap, and the market would have needed no correction because it wouldn't have gotten out of hand. This is circular reasoning. The market works on the information that is available at a given time, which includes all the fudging of numbers that salespeople and marketers…

No, it's not circular logic. Lying to the public, to the government, false reporting is illegal, and against a lot of other controls and regulations that are in place to support a healthy free market. There is a lot of information that does not have to be made public and people can do as they please with it - but this was not the cause of 2008, for the most part.

" The circular logic IMHO is in thinking that the market can prevent this by itself"

It's not circular logic because nobody really thinks that the market will stop corruption by itself.

And FYI if regulations and laws were not in place, forget about 'market correction', there would be no market to begin with. See: dysfunctional, corrupt states. They barely have 'markets'.

"but do you feel if regulatory bodies were given more power to execute on already existing laws"

I don't know. It might not be a matter of law or even policy, but failure of those in the office. Maybe they were understaffed, or had the wrong incentives.

Banks have tons of oversight committees and auditors, and they call kind of failed as well.

Major funds buying huge bundled up mortgages were maybe a little lazy in not doing diligence, but that's a 'market' thing not a regulatory thing.

It was a lot of big and small failures - market and regulatory, that caused 2008.

If everyone is cheating it's not going to work.

Re: Soviet Collapse Echoes in China’s Belt and Road

#128

Post by kbart »

Heh, again China 'collapses', such articles keep coming for ~20 years now, yet it's only getting stronger. If I had to bet my money, I would bet that China will outlast any current major power and USA is in much more dangerous position stabbing long time allies in the backs, isolating itself and monkey for a president.

Re: Soviet Collapse Echoes in China’s Belt and Road

#129

Post by jwhitlark »

taobility wrote: post #42
rgbrenner wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think to look at any particular war and ask that question leads to an inaccurate answer... since there are years of prep work, training, research, etc that the military conducts, then in a short period of time they expend equipment, munitions, etc during a war. But consider, the cost of labor effects everything the military does... Everyone in the entire chain commands a higher wage than they would in China/Russia,…

I agree part of your point. But you forgot another huge difference that, US has involved lots of wars in the past three decades, but China didn't, which spend trillion dollars, either on labor or not, but that money just wasted without any outcoming. You can check out what Jack Ma commented about this in World Economic Forum 2017: https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2017/01/jack-ma-america-has-w...

Wasted perhaps in immediate strategic outcomes. But don't discount blooding troops, burning in systems and building institutional knowledge, which are strategic assets. One can certainly argue if it was worth it, though.

Re: Soviet Collapse Echoes in China’s Belt and Road

#130

Post by ddebernardy »

kbart wrote: post #128

Heh, again China 'collapses', such articles keep coming for ~20 years now, yet it's only getting stronger. If I had to bet my money, I would bet that China will outlast any current major power and USA is in much more dangerous position stabbing long time allies in the backs, isolating itself and monkey for a president.

FWIW, if some reports are anything to go by (see e.g. [1]), and indeed China itself (see e.g. [2]), China has an enormous (and growing) pile of bad debt. If true, things could get very ugly when the bubble pops.

[1]: http://carnegieendowment.org/chinafinancialmarkets/75355

[2]: https://www.caixinglobal.com/2017-10-20/china-must-guard-aga...

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