81–90 of 141 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Beijing?
I actually haven't been to a Beijing Starbucks, but in Shanghai, Hangzhou and Ningbo, Starbucks products are markedly more expensive. I imagine that for Beijing the same would be true. I suppose I shouldn't speak for China as a whole, as I haven't been to Starbucks all over the country.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Frappuccinos are more expensive in Beijing than Seattle (I know, I have a habit...). Actually, many things in China are more expensive than in the states: if you want the "lower cost of living", you have to be willing to endure the "lower standard of living" that is possible in China without as much stigma as in the US. If you want a nice apartment, nice safe food, decent education for your kids, a car, medical care,…
While that may be true, I still think parents ELI5 explanation of the problem with PPP in this scenario is very good. When we are looking at the largest economy in the world, we are looking at world wide numbers and as an American or European most of China is going to feel very cheap.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Frappuccinos are more expensive in Beijing than Seattle (I know, I have a habit...). Actually, many things in China are more expensive than in the states: if you want the "lower cost of living", you have to be willing to endure the "lower standard of living" that is possible in China without as much stigma as in the US. If you want a nice apartment, nice safe food, decent education for your kids, a car, medical care,…
Or fresh air.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Ironically, Big Macs are on sale right now for 10 kuai in Beijing.
Nice. Maybe not in China, but some countries force McDonald's to lower their BigMac price to hack that index. The Wikipedia page mentions countries doing this, and, seeing the quality and price of Big Macs in some places compared to other Mc burgers, it's not surprising. E.g. the Argentinian one was half price of everything else, it was an awful burger, meat covering half the bun. And it was never advertised, only co…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Just curious how you think the US economy could expand without increasing debt. My understanding is that the amount of transactions occurring is dependent on the amount of money in circulation. The amount of money in circulation is directly dependent on debt through the fractional reserve banking system. Under the current system, the only way to 'grow the economy' is to increase the volume of transactions or use mone…
Money is created via debt, but the economy expands when people create things of value.
In the philosophical sense of economy, where transactions are not necessarily tied to physical units of currency, expanding can mean pretty much anything, from more participants and transactions to goodwill gained through personal relationships.
In the physical reality of the US economy, expanding economy really only means more money or more transaction volume.
Having a been in China a lot its easy to see why. China is really striving to be number 1. They are setting a goal and accomplishing it. American on the other hand is mired in Bureaucracy and lack of vision for what we want to do. Therefore we can not make progress. When we have goals we accomplish them. What to end foreign dependence on fossil fuels. We are making good progress towards that end.
American needs to think bigger and accomplish hard near term goals. We need to stop saying by year 2030,2040,2050 and think we want to do this in the next 4 years. China as many advantages of US. The things that people say are a disadvantage (Population & Government) are an advantage over the US.
If i was able to be president this would be my stance:
- Immigration.
- Pay tuition to a 4 year college and graduate. Greencard. Increases intellectual horsepower
- 3 million Mexicans. Greencard. Increases manpower
- Energy
- by 2020 50% of all electric will be generated by non-fossil fuels. 2025 80%.
- 2025 be the #1 export of oil and coal
- Budget. balanced by 2020.
- Military. halved.
- Education. Spending doubled.
- Healthcare. free
- Taxes. flat
- Infrastructure 7% GDP
- Moon by 2030 a sustainable colony.
- Mars by 2040 a sustainable colony.
- Mars by 2050 100,000 people
- Population 500,000 by 2040
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Australia being a great place to live - they don't have a slider for "Deadly animals" Australia has poisonous snakes and America has grizzly bears -- only New Zealand can claim no deadly animals.
Obviously you have never met a drunk kiwi.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Frappuccinos are more expensive in Beijing than Seattle (I know, I have a habit...). Actually, many things in China are more expensive than in the states: if you want the "lower cost of living", you have to be willing to endure the "lower standard of living" that is possible in China without as much stigma as in the US. If you want a nice apartment, nice safe food, decent education for your kids, a car, medical care,…
Frappuccinos are sold as a luxury aspirational product though. Thats what the PPP adjustment is supposed to adjust for, although the PPP calculation makes a lot of assumptions, and could well not be that good a measure.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
China is 1 billion plus people. They have a large role to play in the world economy unless they do something really stupid or terrible. They were the largest economy in the world throughout much of history, if I recall correctly.
From the Sui (late 500's) to the mid-Qing (around 1750) most historians seem to say they were, though it's hard to say whether the Han (220bc-220ad) or the Roman Empire was "larger".
This is a ranking about PPP. There are about five Chinese persons for every American. The sum of their income will keep getting larger and so will their economy. GDP and economic output don't automatically relate to how well people live but they do relate to the influence a country has over the world. If we care about how happy people are in their country then maybe we should look at http://www.oecdbetterlifeindex.or…