Macrocompassion
New member
The one thing that all communists abhor has come to China, as it comes to any other country that mimics the West. This is the polarization of society into the rich and poor fractions. The basic cause of this polarization is unequal opportunity for workers to have access to land. This applies equally to farming land (which is inexpensive per unit area) and urban land (which is very costly).
When the land is controlled by a small proportion of the people, these land owners naturally tend to exploit its rising value, and they do this by reducing the competition for its use. Valuable land is held out of use and the cost of using the rest is raised as a result and less of it is available for use. The state monopolies that have grown in China are at heart no different from the business monopolies of the US and both depend on this speculation and control of access in land values.
Sun-Yet Sen and Henry George (Chinese and American economists of the 19 th century) both explained and understood this phenomena, but even today few people remember them or what they said.
If you visit Hong Kong you will find conditions different. This is not due to the fact that the control was British for many years and has now passed to China. The reason is because land is still leased from the (Chinese) government there and not owned, which avoids land speculation and gives a greater equality of opportunity for its use.
When the land is controlled by a small proportion of the people, these land owners naturally tend to exploit its rising value, and they do this by reducing the competition for its use. Valuable land is held out of use and the cost of using the rest is raised as a result and less of it is available for use. The state monopolies that have grown in China are at heart no different from the business monopolies of the US and both depend on this speculation and control of access in land values.
Sun-Yet Sen and Henry George (Chinese and American economists of the 19 th century) both explained and understood this phenomena, but even today few people remember them or what they said.
If you visit Hong Kong you will find conditions different. This is not due to the fact that the control was British for many years and has now passed to China. The reason is because land is still leased from the (Chinese) government there and not owned, which avoids land speculation and gives a greater equality of opportunity for its use.