Toeing the party line, Mainland Chinese netizens remain loud and proud that it was their CCP government which had bailed the West out during the Great Recession (2008-10). They, however, cannot bring themselves to ask why their CCP government has so far failed to lift a finger and bail Evergrande out. Truth be told, Beijing is giving Evergrande the middle finger. 

Back in September 2008, Washington was also giving the Lehman (Brothers) the middle finger, the consequence of which was a total disaster. Of course, China can't wait to point out that Evergrande is not Lehman. But, what if China itself is becoming Lehman? 

At the height of their bubble economy in the 1980s, Japanese had about 65% of their wealth tied to real estate. Today, Chinese have 80% of their fortunes invested in home ownership. That's why they can't afford a Japanese-styled collapse of the housing market. Being house-rich but cash-poor is bad enough. Being house-poor and cash-poor will be a nightmare come true. "Common prosperity," otherwise known as "robbing the rich to pay the poor," won't be nearly enough on the day of reckoning.

China had 40 years of economic growth to establish itself as a consumer society like America. To this day, however, China has yet to wean itself off export-dependency. Competing with its fellow exporters, China needs to cut its production costs. As such, Chinese workers have to accept a less-than-fair wage share of the GDP. To them, common austerity, not common prosperity, is the reality. 

To America, China never exports or sells anything ultimately indispensable. From America, China has all along been importing and buying something ultimately indispensable. So, on balance, America is factually more self-sufficient than China. Meanwhile, the US Navy is practically in control of all the choke points where China's sea trade routes are concerned.* At the end of the day, who will have the final say, America or China?

--- by Lingyang Jiang

      * USN Fleet Tracker: October 4, 2021 

         (Open source: U.S. Naval Institute)

"These are the approximate positions of the U.S. Navy’s deployed carrier strike groups (CSG) and amphibious ready groups (ARG) throughout the world as of Oct. 4, 2021, based on Navy and public data. In cases where a CSG or ARG is conducting disaggregated operations, the chart reflects the location of the capital ship."