Posted on 09/07/2021 9:57:11 PM PDT by SeekAndFind
Beijing has rolled out new regulations that could destroy various industries in China, including entertainment, tech, private education, and gaming.
Xi Jinping is cracking down on celebrities, as well as Western influence in Chinese culture. He wants to reform capital markets so they will not be places where the rich can get rich quickly. The CCP leader is also not fond of videos games and has ordered that children be limited to one hour per day—Friday, Saturday, and Sunday only. The Bitcoin miners have also become targets for elimination, as they waste state resources. And, although tech companies have been the backbone of China’s transformation from poverty to prosperity, Xi has decided that he hates them too. Somehow, Xi claims that all of these new prohibitions are tied to amending China’s massive wealth gap.
In order to tame, what he calls, the country’s rampant fan culture, Xi has banned social media platforms from publishing popularity lists or selling celebrity merchandise. Online celebrities and influencers, modelled on androgynous K-pop stars, draw large numbers of fans who spend money to help them win contests. But not anymore. Xi is waging war on both, celebrities and their fans, in order to eliminate “improper idol worship.”
Tattoos and earrings on men will no longer be tolerated on TV, not even in sports. Certain talent TV shows have been banned. “Correct beauty standards” will be implemented, and entertainers are being cautioned not to be “overly entertaining.” The CCP sees celebrities and entertaining TV shows as distracting citizens from their love for and obedience to the Party. Celebrities are now being arrested on various charges, including tax evasion, having their social media accounts shut down, or having their names and work removed from the internet completely.
Jack Ma, founder of Alibaba, is perhaps the best example of Xi’s crackdown on big tech. Ma is one of the most famous Chinese people, known around the world. He is also the epitome of the tech billionaire. And it is perhaps this fame that attracted the ire of the Chinese regime. Last year, Beijing blocked the $34.5 billion IPO of his Ant Group. Shortly afterwards, Ma disappeared for almost three months.
The Jack Ma story may have served as a warning to other big-tech entrepreneurs, but when Xi gave a speech about “common prosperity” asking the wealthy, particularly the tech billionaires, to give back, they did. Xiaomi’s chairman, Lei Jun, gave away $2.2 billion in company shares to his charitable foundations. Additionally, five of China’s richest tech billionaires have pledged a total of more than $13 billion to charitable foundations. None have spoken out publicly against the new policies.
Gini coefficient is the measure of wealth disparity in a country. A Gini of 5 or more is cause for worry and a potential for social instability. In 2020, China’s Gini hit 70.4. While China has nearly as many billionaires as the United States, 600 million Chinese citizens have a monthly income of only $209. Therefore, China definitely has a wealth gap. The question is whether or not Beijing could or should do anything about it.
Economics teaches that markets generally bring about the most efficient outcomes, and that government intervention in markets always causes inefficiencies. Furthermore, there are countless examples, where government intervention has the exact opposite of its intended effect. In the case of Xi’s crackdowns, in order to help families that were struggling financially, Xi has put an end to for-profit tuition and supplemental education centers. And with that single pronouncement, he put 10 million people out of work. That most likely will not help struggling families, particularly after most of the country suffered months and months of COVID-19 lockdowns.
This blow comes while the nation, as a whole, is facing 5.5 percent urban unemployment. And this figure does not include tens of millions of unemployed migrant workers who have been laid off from factories. Neither does it include the 10 percent rate of unemployment among young people and new graduates, some of whom would probably have been very happy to work in a supplemental education center.
College students and graduates sit by a sidewalk offering their tutoring services, in Xi’an, central China’s Shaanxi Province, in this undated photo. Millions of college graduates in China are finding themselves with no jobs waiting, or end up performing work for which they are overqualified.
Chinese children will no longer be able to access extra English lessons, while the companies that used to teach them are going bankrupt. One of the larger supplemental education providers, Juren Education, declared bankruptcy, but fearing being accused of criticizing government policy, they told parents that they were closing shop because of “operational difficulties.”
It is estimated that China’s afterschool tutoring business was valued at 564 billion yuan (US$87.65 billion). This money has just evaporated from the economy. One of the reasons given for the decision to kill this golden goose was that in Chinese education, the state must control discourse and ideology. But in private tuition centers, the state had very little ability to do this.
The gaming industry was valued at over 377 billion yuan. Ostensibly, the new gaming restrictions will not drive this industry to zero, as it did with supplemental education, but the new restrictions must be expected to take a huge bite out of total revenues. Gaming was cancelled because the CCP felt the children were engaging in “spiritual opium,” which distracted them from Beijing’s “correct values.”
Xi has claimed to have a new economic plan—”Xiconomics” as well as the dual-circulation strategy, and “common prosperity” (a wealth redistribution scheme)—to mitigate wealth inequality and to help the country recover from COVID economy. The steps he is taking seem to be ones that would drive the economy down, not up. Additionally, these policies are eliminating much needed jobs. Even more, it was the tech sector that created high-paying jobs, moving Chinese workers out of toy factories and into cutting-edge offices and labs. Curbing the tech companies could move China back down the manufacturing value chain.
Tech companies are already required to have Party appointees on their boards, and with recent crackdowns, CEOs are getting nervous. Would-be investors also see the draconian steps as dramatically increasing risk, making Chinese tech investment less attractive. This should have a negative impact on Chinese innovation and access to capital, as well as on China’s long-term economic growth.
These policies do, however, provide the state a firmer control on the citizenry, on their culture, and their day-to-day lives, dictating how they relax, how they invest, and even which celebrities they are permitted to fantasize about. Parallel to all of these restrictions, the CCP announced that the teaching of “Xi Jinping Thought” would now be mandatory in primary and secondary schools, nationwide. It seems the only star permitted in China is Xi himself.
Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.
Is Jinping giving up on fascism and returning to his communist roots?
Maybe he felt like he was losing control?
I always speculated that eventually would destroy their economy knowing it would destroy the US economy in the process, and that China would be in better position to withstand it than the US.
Gave them a bit of freedom and the ungrateful wretches wanted more freedom.
Maybe the central committee will have him arrested, or even whacked.
China’s run by five families.....they will survive along with China regardless of any crackdowns. Their country and people have hit hard economic times often and know how to weather it all regardless of the losses. Their history shows as much. Though XI may not have his forever position.....there’s always someone in the wings should he not. But the country will survive any economic downturn.
This guy is serious about being CCP General Secretary for life.
Consolidating power, it’s the commie way.
Is everyone missing the global redistribution of wealth towards China through consumer goods shortages and price hikes?
The thing is, if China thinks that by imploding its own economy it will take the US with it, then they are delusional. There is the “rest of the world” not just the USA. Even with AHOLE libs messing some things up, Americans are used to making order from chaos...we are simply not command economy oriented. So we have some lean years and our callow youths learn to be responsible money wise and work wise. I think we can survive China’s own suicide.
China gets no wealth if they mess with the distribution lines. It will be painful but after all there is the “rest of the world’ that can reorient away from China. Let China cut its own throat.
For one thing Xi is going old school by trying to set up a cult of personality around himself.
CC
Several years ago, I read an article, claiming that Xi was a leader of the “true Marxists” fraction of the CCP. At that time, this fraction was rather small, and he had been chosen because the other feuding fractions found him harmless.
Apparently, he is not harmless any more.
“Their country and people have hit hard economic times often and know how to weather it all regardless of the losses. Their history shows as much.”
Their history? Maybe so.
But this is a completely different world. This isn’t the generation that built the economy in China.
Young people, products of the One Child policy, see no hope of getting jobs they are qualified for or of making enough money to start a family plus support their aging parents as they are expected to do.
They have developed the Lying Flat movement. A sort of screw it, it ain’t worth it mentality.
The Lying Flat movement...
https://youtu.be/uWl7njLlXLU
Also the two younger generations have never known the crushing poverty that Mao imposed with his various plans and the Great Leap.
In short, their kids feel even more entitled than our own.
China is living in interesting times.
The thing about communism is,
once they run out of enemies…
…they never really run out of enemies.
Yes, let’s do that here leftists…
To Xi, maintaining CCP control overrides EVERYTHING else.
He must be worried that allowing a middle class threatens that control.
“Jack Ma, founder of Alibaba, is perhaps the best example of Xi’s crackdown on big tech. Ma is one of the most famous Chinese people, known around the world. He is also the epitome of the tech billionaire. And it is perhaps this fame that attracted the ire of the Chinese regime. Last year, Beijing blocked the $34.5 billion IPO of his Ant Group. Shortly afterwards, Ma disappeared for almost three months.”
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Point of fact - no one has actually seen Horse Cloud since he disappeared, only third hand reports, leading many to believe he is in pieces and parts in a cooler awaiting transplant.
Is Jinping giving up on fascism and returning to his communist roots?
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FYI: Fascism came out of the Communist movement as a way to eventually implement Communism.
Xi was never a Fascist. You might imagine Dong and his successors as pseudo-Fascists, but hey were always communists first.
How China has governed it’s country is very much like it always has been with a focus that was on trade and the people being the producers. Regardless how the young people imagine or think they certainly are acquainted with their history.
How much of our debt is owned by China?
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