The Chinese economy is deeply weird from a western perspective. Culture and economics are not orthogonal.

They made their domestic steel industry ‘flourish’ by getting every peasant to make their own steel mills too, and mostly crashed their economies.

When things line up and the decisions are decent, top down can be really good.

When the decisions are bad, it is exceptionally dramatic failures too. Tofu dregs, etc.

Right now, no one has to liquidate so it’s easy to hide the damage though.

Other governments do, but not as much as China does.

Healthcare in South Korea for example is government managed and it is one of the best healthcare in the world.

I believe utility companies are also government owned.

Also some of the well known companies now were practically government owned during the Park dictatorship in the 70s.

I wouldn't use the term "Flourish" as what you hear and see is strictly controlled

The government paying for your output which has nowhere to go is not a flourishing industry.

If my kid starts a lemonade stand and I pay him $500 to dump 20 gallons of lemonade into the sewer, did he run a successful business for a day?

Look into the Chinese ghost cities or US and EU actions against Chinese metals dumping.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Underoccupied_developments_in_...

Any government can and does regularly throw money at industries to make them flourish. The American propaganda claims that this is less efficient than letting market forces decide which companies win.

I believe it is more complicated than simply “throwing money at industries”. It seems to me that in China, the Government actually runs the country, while in the US, private capital does.

Government central planning and industrial policy is always less efficient than free markets. But government can sometimes be more effective in accomplishing critical strategic goals when those are more important than efficiency.

As if the west does not use tariffs and subsidies. China is simply much smarter about it and has much more functional institutions.

> If the Chinese government can just throw money at industries and have them flourish, why can't other governments?

One possibility that seems likely to me: it takes longer than a single election cycle for an investment like that to bear fruit. And you have to be willing to admit that some bets the state places will lose. This is harder in the kind of democracy and political climate that the US currently has. China's government has more continuity of leadership and a strong emphasis on stability that seem hard to achieve in the US without a lot more political cohesion and more nuanced opposition than the two-party system currently affords.

If we could achieve it, though, it'd be awesome. Some "best of both worlds" stuff.

The US government could throw tons of money at everything and get some good results, that doesn't mean it would be efficient. And their system is fundamentally different, I think most westerners would appreciate less efficient AI companies in return for democracy and human rights.

Chinese students study like it is Battle Royale Squid Game. Just read up what is Gaokao. And boosted by nearly 1/3 of household income for extra classes. And other study resources. You have that in America but the volume is closer to 500 to 1. This is why before Trump you see American colleges saturated with 20%+ Chinese students. India also the same but the second factor comes in. Proximity. They build universities powerplant factories port airports in cluster. So wastage due to "in between logistics" minimized. And finally everything is way way cheaper in China compare to even cheapest American town. So even if corruption is bad, the underlying structure ensure efficient output multitude higher than peak America. Another country have similar design is Singapore but they lack the talents and resources of China. This can't be replicated in America. American parents don't go nuts spending 30-60% HOUSEHOLD income for education. Most American parents already struggling paying gas and electricity bills. At best they give their children access to TikTok and Snapchat and hint them do sports like Tiger or Beyonce twerking to fame and wealth.

Not really. Dumping != flourishing