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Here's an article about young people rushing in droves to buy Home Ownership Scheme apartments in Hong Kong. Pretty standard housing craze stuff, but it's just that much sadder because it's kids getting swindled.SCMP posted:"If I don't purchase now, I don't know when the housing prices will stop skyrocketing," said Chan Hung-cheung, 21, who is studying digital music and media at the Hong Kong Design Institute. It's an HOS apartment, which means it's sold for a 30% discount on the market price. SCMP posted:Flats with saleable areas ranging from 506 sq ft to 650 sq ft, are offered to families earning no more than HK$40,000 a month and have total net household assets of less than HK$830,000. For individuals the limits are halved. Prices of the flats - set at a 30 per cent discount on market value, range from HK$1,194,500 to HK$2,105,900. So he can pay upwards of 150k USD to buy a cupboard. Sure it's a 30% discount of the current market price, but bank estimates (which tend to be conservative) show that a return of the Fed to a 3% interest rate could see housing prices drop 50%. That's without considering any of the mainland's house of cards collapsing. And then this 21-year-old kid who borrowed money from his parents has a worthless cupboard that he sank his inheritance into. It's sad stuff. He should be renting.
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Mar 22, 2013 09:41
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| # ? Jun 8, 2024 00:45 |
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What is bankruptcy like in Hong Kong?
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Mar 22, 2013 10:04
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I'm not familiar with it, but supposedly there are still debtor's prisons here.
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Mar 22, 2013 10:18
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GuestBob posted:
Veers into Lovecraft territory there, what the hell?
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Mar 22, 2013 11:43
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WarpedNaba posted:Have there been any internal studies as to the rising gender gap of newborns in the rural areas? I recall a while ago that there was a cause for alarm due to far more girls being aborted once their gender was determined, and that skewed the sexes a little. South Korea once had a birth rate gap that was just as wide as China's (possibly even wider) back in the 70's and 80's I think. They managed to close it considerably in two decades. I don't think it's an insurmountable problem as long as something is being done. Then again i'm skeptical that the China government really wants to do anything about it. The gender gap negatively impacts the lower income/rural population the most while the middle class and above seem to have no issues with finding a wife or a whole harem of mistresses in the case of the rich.
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Mar 22, 2013 15:42
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Modus Operandi posted:South Korea once had a birth rate gap that was just as wide as China's (possibly even wider) back in the 70's and 80's I think. They managed to close it considerably in two decades. I don't think it's an insurmountable problem as long as something is being done. Then again i'm skeptical that the China government really wants to do anything about it. The gender gap negatively impacts the lower income/rural population the most while the middle class and above seem to have no issues with finding a wife or a whole harem of mistresses in the case of the rich. China and South Korea had pretty similar levels of gender imbalance from the early 80s through the mid 90s (though South Korea was 'ahead' in the 70s). Then, as you noted, the situation in South Korea got much better in the 90s, but while that was happening China's imbalance rose to absurd levels that had never been reached in South Korea. It isn't quite as bad today as in, say, 2004, but it's going to be a much bigger problem for China down the road than it is/will be for South Korea.
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Mar 22, 2013 16:10
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dilbertschalter posted:China and South Korea had pretty similar levels of gender imbalance from the early 80s through the mid 90s (though South Korea was 'ahead' in the 70s). Then, as you noted, the situation in South Korea got much better in the 90s, but while that was happening China's imbalance rose to absurd levels that had never been reached in South Korea. It isn't quite as bad today as in, say, 2004, but it's going to be a much bigger problem for China down the road than it is/will be for South Korea. Of love to see the data for this, I wonder how fast a gender gap can be corrected.
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Mar 22, 2013 17:57
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GlassEye-Boy posted:Of love to see the data for this, I wonder how fast a gender gap can be corrected.  Another similar graph:  Illustrates the crux of the problem nicely: 
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Mar 22, 2013 18:42
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One other factor is that the gender gap doesn't necessarily represent girls and women that aren't there. Especially in the rural areas, it might represent people who exist but are living off the books.
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Mar 22, 2013 19:02
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effectual posted:Veers into Lovecraft territory there, what the hell? I think it was all the opium. Mc Do Well fucked around with this message at 18:41 on Mar 23, 2013 |
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Mar 23, 2013 00:08
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Yeah but US consumers probably don't have enough purchasing power left to create the same export led transformation within China as South Korea. Ultimately, economics probably has a substantial part to play within the equation.
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Mar 23, 2013 07:52
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dilbertschalter posted:
Is this income quartiles?
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Mar 23, 2013 11:07
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VideoTapir posted:Is this income quartiles? I think it is the number of children.
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Mar 23, 2013 17:39
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It's the male to female ratio at birth for first children, second children, third children and fourth+ children. The ratio for first children is normal and the ratio for second children was only a bit skewed even during the bad days, but the ratio for third and beyond was terrifying (fourth+ children born in 1993 were ~2.3 times more likely to be male than female) and is still bad. In other words, a large percentage of the three children and more group already had two daughters and only were interested in having more children to preserve the glorious family line.
dilbertschalter fucked around with this message at 18:08 on Mar 23, 2013 |
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Mar 23, 2013 18:04
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Moving this to the D&D threadBloodnose posted:In related news, the Court of Final Appeal is handing down its verdict about Filipino and Indonesian domestic workers' right to Hong Kong permanent residency today. I don't understand how people don't see the obvious horror in what they're saying. "If they got permanent residency, they would try to get better jobs! They'd want places to live! They'd want education for their children! They would get health care!" The only way you can possibly view the fact that right now, domestics aren't entitled to those things, as okay, is if you don't see them as human beings on the same level as middle class Hong Kongers. You saw the same stuff come up when there was a debate about domestics getting the minimum wage (they are currently exempted from it), where these middle class people would say "  if maids get the minimum wage then how can we afford our lifestyle? We couldn't afford to pay someone to take care of our kids ."It's a complete cognitive dissonance with the fact that if the middle class can't afford to pay a maid minimum wage, how is a maid supposed to live? Life for the middle class in Hong Kong is lovely, we all know that. But it's pretty horrible that they do their best to push as much of that horror onto underpriveliged southeast Asians as they can. Right now there's a moratorium on maids coming in from the Philippines, because the Manila government has banned the practice of agencies charging maids a 'placement fee' usually around two to three months of wages. The Hong Kong agencies say that's untenable because they have to pay for the maids' plane tickets and they refuse to pass that expense on to the Hong Kong families. Guess what, though? Bangladesh is coming to the rescue. From June, Bangladeshi maids will be allowed to work in Hong Kong, giving some diversity to the domestic profession that is currently dominated (51% and 49% respectively) by Indonesians and Filipinos. We'll see how that goes.
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Mar 25, 2013 06:48
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Bloodnose posted:I don't understand how people don't see the obvious horror in what they're saying. "If they got permanent residency, they would try to get better jobs! They'd want places to live! They'd want education for their children! They would get health care!"
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Mar 25, 2013 07:01
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This guy is just amazingIRDHK posted:Also domestic helpers do not pay HK taxes or have to pay into a MPF accounts. Do not need to find a residence or pay for food. They get free medical and twice a year get paid home leave. Most have little work to do between 8 am and 4 m. They don't need to worry about electricity, water or gas bills. They don't need to pay transportation. They are treated like princesses while in Hong Kong. I am sure many people in cage homes or subsidized houses would love the privilage life that a domestic helper has. F they tire of their employer they just leave and turn around and sue them. There are 2 whole courts in HK just of maids suing employers. IRDHK posted:There is no racism. Racism would be saying come here and then say they don't have a right to permanent residency. Hong Kong knew that the population could not take on 150,000 extra permanent residents but it also want to give domestic helpers from poorer countries opportunities to improve while also helping people in HK.
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Mar 25, 2013 14:35
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Bloodnose posted:This guy is just amazing What are the major long term ramifications of this? Almost everything posted in this thread about China seems to point to a rapidly approaching tipping point where everything collapses and makes the 2008 bank crises look like mild inconvenience. Treating foreign workers like poo poo just seems to be par for the course, unless I'm missing a major consequence of this.
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Mar 25, 2013 14:51
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No, sorry. I don't always post that doom is descending upon the world. This time it's just a look and laugh at how horrible this thing is. Look at how wrong these opinions are. If you want something 'bigger', Andy Xie wrote another column and he always has some awesome things to say. This one is about a Chinese asset bubble, but it's not really doom and gloom. The title is 'China Can Afford to Let Its Bubble Economy Burst.'
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Mar 25, 2013 14:54
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Bloodnose posted:No, sorry. I don't always post that doom is descending upon the world. This time it's just a look and laugh at how horrible this thing is. Look at how wrong these opinions are. Andie Xie's article posted:
Uhh, I was under the distinct impression that the leaders were the vested interests.
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Mar 25, 2013 15:04
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pentyne posted:What are the major long term ramifications of this? Almost everything posted in this thread about China seems to point to a rapidly approaching tipping point where everything collapses and makes the 2008 bank crises look like mild inconvenience. Well you have to remember my doom-and-gloom posts about the party/state are not necessarily about doom and gloom for China the nation. The Eastern Bloc states were clearly destined for failure and nobody shed many tears for them after the 1989 revolutions, and their nations are all doing much better without them. The PRC transitioning peacefully to a successor state is not too hard to imagine if enough of the ruling elite finally come to the conclusion that the PRC is an unsustainable system. You may scoff at the idea of the party elite heading a revolution but factions within the ruling elite are a common, perhaps the most common, originator of peaceful revolutions.
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Mar 25, 2013 15:43
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Arglebargle III posted:Well you have to remember my doom-and-gloom posts about the party/state are not necessarily about doom and gloom for China the nation. The Eastern Bloc states were clearly destined for failure and nobody shed many tears for them after the 1989 revolutions, and their nations are all doing much better without them. The PRC transitioning peacefully to a successor state is not too hard to imagine if enough of the ruling elite finally come to the conclusion that the PRC is an unsustainable system. You may scoff at the idea of the party elite heading a revolution but factions within the ruling elite are a common, perhaps the most common, originator of peaceful revolutions. In my opinion, it will get worse repression wise before it gets better. They have nothing to lose by cracking down more until it starts to seriously bite into the economy. The middle class will be co-opted through enhanced food safety and environmental policies. Increased repression might cut into FDI on the margins, but China needs FDI less than it used to and foreign companies will not start to leave unless it gets really bad. Soy Division fucked around with this message at 16:19 on Mar 25, 2013 |
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Mar 25, 2013 16:07
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Yeah it's definitely worth bearing in mind that the CCP has pretty much been carefully attempting to analyse the transitions that have happened since 1989 with a view to making sure no such thing will happen in China. There's an interesting article specifically on China's continuing preoccupation with the fall of the Soviet Union, and they're well aware of these pacted transitions where schisms in the ruling elite drove democratization:quote:... even if this “negative learning” process doesn’t explain the whole story behind the CCP’s continued existence, it seems to play a not insignificant role. This theory is in keeping with several of the “lessons learned” volumes or studies which have come out of China in the years following the Soviet collapse. For example, in 1999, CASS [Chinese Academy of Social Sciences] researchers undertook a country-by-country assessment of the causes of the collapse of communist party-states, particularly those of Eastern Europe. They found three overarching elements that seemed to be at play in each of the countries. There were “splits within, and the democratization of, the ruling party; ordinary people’s discontent, which was taken advantage of by opposition forces; and the Western campaign of peaceful evolution.” In many regards actually the CCP strengthened its ideological rigour in the 90s and the 2000s, driven by the experience of Tiananmen in the first place and assorted fears over things like the rural-urban divide (hence the New Socialist Countryside policy) and rising inequality in general.
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Mar 25, 2013 19:12
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Here's my favorite comment so far from the domestics not getting PR article:KMT posted:HK people will always remember the Manila hostage crisis.
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Mar 26, 2013 02:35
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-21930280 China buys four Lada class submarines and two dozen Su-35s from Russia. I think that the subs are a charity buy and will probably be used for training, because the Lada class has engine and sonar problems (according to Wiki). They follow the Kilo class (which follow the Golf class I think), which are one of three classes of submarines which form the mainstay of China's conventional submarine fleet. Not sure why China isn't just focussing on building more Han or Yuan class subs though (the lead SSN and SSK boats respectivley), maybe this is evidence of problems with those vessels. Here's something I didn't know. The PLAN builds submarines in Wuhan. Wuhan. Jesus the Yangtze is some kind of river. The Su-35 is just boss though. Also, I was chatting today with a colleaugue about how Mrs. Xi seems to be more visible on foreign trips than the wife of Grandpa Wen.
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Mar 26, 2013 06:35
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GuestBob posted:http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-21930280 This and the aircraft carrier they bought, aren't they barely functional and incapable of anything but sailing around the China Sea and needing incredible amounts of work to keep floating? China keeps trying to put on a show of force projection but their naval force is hilariously weak.
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Mar 26, 2013 09:08
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pentyne posted:This and the aircraft carrier they bought, aren't they barely functional and incapable of anything but sailing around the China Sea and needing incredible amounts of work to keep floating? China keeps trying to put on a show of force projection but their naval force is hilariously weak. In term of blue water ops, yes. Because they can't mount a combat air patrol they also can't manage a resisted landing of any kind (imagine the Falklands without Harriers). But they do have roughly the same amphibious sealift as the UK, which isn't hilarious in itself. The PLAN is really, really defensive in design. Which is kind of reassuring I think.
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Mar 26, 2013 10:51
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pentyne posted:This and the aircraft carrier they bought, aren't they barely functional and incapable of anything but sailing around the China Sea and needing incredible amounts of work to keep floating? China keeps trying to put on a show of force projection but their naval force is hilariously weak. That carrier will never ever see action. For all intents and purposes it's a training carrier for now.
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Mar 26, 2013 11:22
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Pro-PRC Laowai posted:That carrier will never ever see action. For all intents and purposes it's a training carrier for now. Pretty much this. When during WWII a Admiral suggest they could keep Malta for sure if they were willing to sacrifice a couple of Battleships his higher up responded saying "It takes only a year to build a battleship, but a hundred for a Naval tradition." China needs that carrier to build up the doctrine and knowhow experiences to build up their carrier force to something approaching combat readiness. Eventually that carrier can be used probably in combat ops once they got a cadre of experienced naval aviation pilots if their intended new ones aren't out of drydock yet for whatever they need a carrier sailing somewhere what for. I imagine once they got some credible air arm up and going and they're sure that "this time" they can go 90 days without a fire they'll use it for good will tours and to help "stabilize" any hot spots particular to Chinese interests similar to 19th century American gunboat diplomacy in South America. Then once they got additional CV's up and running Laoning will go back to active training services unless they really need it.
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Mar 26, 2013 11:32
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Raenir Salazar posted:Eventually that carrier can be used probably in combat ops once they got a cadre of experienced naval aviation pilots if their intended new ones aren't out of drydock yet for whatever they need a carrier sailing somewhere what for. Can I also add to this the difficulty of operating a carrier within a task group: something which NATO countries have alot of practice with but which other countries don't. One of the most difficult things about using a carrier is how to fit in the fact that it needs to sail at full clip in a straight line into the wind for landing on and off. Which is alot more difficult than you might think if you have threats to contend with. You're right to cite the idea of "tradition" or doctrine because carrier ops are some of the most complex poo poo out there. Between the hanger, the flight deck, the air crew, the flight deck managers, the warfare officer, the bridge officer and the task group there is gently caress all room for mistakes. Add the fact that the Chinese navy have never done live damage control in a conflict situation and you have a long way to go before they could beat the odds. To be quite honest, there are precious few navies out there who could handle a missile strike and keep fighting (US, UK, French, maybe Canadian, Aus. and NZ). But as I say, it's not really a priority. GuestBob fucked around with this message at 11:58 on Mar 26, 2013 |
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Mar 26, 2013 11:52
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Raenir Salazar posted:Eventually that carrier can be used probably in combat ops once they got a cadre of experienced naval aviation pilots if their intended new ones aren't out of drydock yet for whatever they need a carrier sailing somewhere what for. With the state of the Chinese military being pay for promotion and the incredible incompetence of the general staffs there is not going to be an 'eventually' for a Chinese naval power until the entire system is broken down and rebuilt from the ground up. Even being able to build a functional aircraft carrier isn't enough, they need decades of training and experience operating it for them to even pretend that their carrier is a potential war machine. pentyne fucked around with this message at 12:04 on Mar 26, 2013 |
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Mar 26, 2013 12:02
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Raenir Salazar posted:Then once they got additional CV's up and running Laoning will go back to active training services unless they really need it. With the way things are going, I honestly wouldn't be all that shocked if they said screw it to traditional aircraft carriers and went with more of a drone-carrier instead, backed up with some live personnel and some non-drones for things that might actually require live people. Putting up their own GPS constellation seems to jive with this concept. If the Anjian project pans out, poo poo could get kinda funny. The way China is investing in drone bases along the borders and up and down the coast, it would make sense.
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Mar 26, 2013 12:45
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Pro-PRC Laowai posted:With the way things are going, I honestly wouldn't be all that shocked if they said screw it to traditional aircraft carriers and went with more of a drone-carrier instead, backed up with some live personnel and some non-drones for things that might actually require live people. Putting something in the air for long periods is great for some things but when you need to actively control an airspace you need people. You don't a carrier for ASW ops (you need an LPH or, better yet, a submarine of your own), you need a carrier to say "don't shoot at my ships/guys whilst we do our thing over here". It's a funky idea, but drones are a long way away from being able to conduct a CAP over a task group or cover a troop landing. [edit] Also, you don't need a loving huge carrier to launch drones - if you buy one of those and then use it for that then, well, you bought your commission.
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Mar 26, 2013 13:03
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GuestBob posted:It's a funky idea, but drones are a long way away from being able to conduct a CAP over a task group or cover a troop landing. I don't know a whole lot about drones, but why not? Just because the drone airframes aren't there? Couldn't you fly a drone equivalent of an FA/18 from an AWACS or something?
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Mar 26, 2013 13:50
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GuestBob posted:Can I also add to this the difficulty of operating a carrier within a task group: something which NATO countries have alot of practice with but which other countries don't. One of the most difficult things about using a carrier is how to fit in the fact that it needs to sail at full clip in a straight line into the wind for landing on and off. Which is alot more difficult than you might think if you have threats to contend with. What about the russian/soviet navy or has russia's abilities decayed tremendously?
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Mar 26, 2013 13:58
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Arglebargle III posted:I don't know a whole lot about drones, but why not? Just because the drone airframes aren't there? Couldn't you fly a drone equivalent of an FA/18 from an AWACS or something? The major problem with drones from what I can tell is that they're really slow; you can't (for now) expect them to compete with something that goes anywhere near the usual speed of a jet fighter, which hampers things slightly.
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Mar 26, 2013 13:59
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Lawman 0 posted:What about the russian/soviet navy or has russia's abilities decayed tremendously? Russia's navy hasn't conducted hot damage control since the early twentieth century (or possibly the days of sail). Also, conscript navy and their poo poo keeps sinking when it goes to sea (which is infrequently). Argle, yes, it's mostly airframe and the fact that if you built a drone large and complex enough to fly CAPs or close ship to shore ground support then you would need to make it quite large and powerful, which would make it very dangerous to fly off a ship. Imagine trying to land a harrier on an LPH from a remote environment. You couldn't even feel the gusts of wind coming off the superstructure. Small drones you can just toss into the air or shoot them off using a Walrus catapult style thingy. But they ain't going to be able to do what you want them to. Besides, gently caress drones. Submarines can do the surveillance and ASW work far better than a drone and they are much, much more useful. Ain't no drone gonna sink my battleship! [edit] VideoTapir posted:What? At sea, god yes. Obviously not for aircraft though, you have AWACS and radar for that poo poo, but for everything else submarines are boss. You don't even know that they are there. GuestBob fucked around with this message at 14:34 on Mar 26, 2013 |
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Mar 26, 2013 14:15
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GuestBob posted:
What?
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Mar 26, 2013 14:23
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computer parts posted:The major problem with drones from what I can tell is that they're really slow; you can't (for now) expect them to compete with something that goes anywhere near the usual speed of a jet fighter, which hampers things slightly. The Anjian project, as described at least, is a super-sonic stealth UCAV drone. Even if the project is cancelled, the research and reason for pursuing it doesn't just vanish and it's pretty much the obvious goal being sought after. As spiffy and neat as bomb-drones and observation drones that can paint a target and provide recon are. Simple fact is that they remain vulnerable in contested airspace and they generally need the ability to loiter. Not all enemies are ready to give up fighters and fighters are stupidly useful in taking out drones unless they are backed by fighters. Modern fighter jets still have a point, but they are expensive and the pilots are just worth too drat much to be honest. A system capable of taking on fighters ain't such a bad idea, be it alone or as a swarm. Losing a drone isn't such a huge deal, and the other odd benefit is that you can bring in mission specialists, so no single remote-pilot has to be a jack-of-all-trades... further reducing training cost and time and also enables a single pilot to control multiple drones. Alternatively, it becomes possible to use drones for manned-fighter support while establishing air superiority. And surveillance, it's an obvious task for carriers. Pop out drones with insane loiter time and perhaps some strike capability for the cap support.
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Mar 26, 2013 16:37
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| # ? Jun 8, 2024 00:45 |
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Haven't the Chinese developed 'carrier killer' cruise missiles? I don't think US levels of force projection are a goal for China. Ships other than carriers with land based air support could secure China's claimed chunk of the Pacific (but this conflicts with the balance of power in place since Japan surrendered)
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Mar 26, 2013 17:01
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