Earlier quoted context omitted.
What I've read is that whereas Western academics and scientists are paid by salary or grant, Chinese scientists are paid substantially by number of papers published. So $500 for a paper in a top-tier journal, etc. Thus scientific papers provide indirect benefits in the West, but direct benefits in China - encouraging the "paper mill."
Publishing papers in the West provides a pretty direct benefit - there's a reason behind the saying 'publish or perish'.
Academia is toxic because again it is being measured. If a university cannot determine the quality of faculty other than counting publications and impact factors, the university itself is seriously lacking quality, alas there is a plague of it.
I wonder if it is directly related to the bloom/infestation of university administration sizes and top salaries.
I'm of the opinion that a university ought to be something like what you'd think a temple to discovery and knowledge ought to be, instead of a mill for producing credentials for students and a shitty game for faculty advancement.
if I had a billion dollars... (to the tune of the Barenaked Ladies)