My understanding is that the Chinese government prefers to have multiple successful companies in each field and they don't like it when one company becomes too powerful.
They pivoted away from that quite a while ago now they just disappear people for a week or two and randomly completely crush a business here and there to make sure they understand their place.
If you have no practical experience living in a totalitarian country, don't wish that upon yourself and your family.
That momentary feeling of triumphing over your enemies won't compensate for what you'd lose. This is a mistake that was made by numerous intellectuals in history.
2010's: Weak men create hard times. There you are, wishing for hard times. May I suggest finding yourself the socialist paradise where they do as you wish and move there? You should be happier and we will be as well as long as your wishes don't come true.
>May I suggest finding yourself the socialist paradise where they do as you wish and move there?
If you promise not to sanction and bomb it and fund and arm far-right wing dictator thugs there, I'm game!
But you got it backwards: it's your "strongmen" and your "elite human capital" that has created hard times, destroyed strong working and middle class men's livelihood, pivoted the economy to financial betting games, outsourcing, and rent-seeking, and enshittified everything.
So also does the US. Trump had prominent cases against Google and Meta. Biden against Apple and Amazon. Prominent efforts on airlines and grocery stores. Honestly, I'm pretty sure the US and Chinese antitrust laws are pretty similar (theirs largely crafted after ours).
State run (or heavily regulated) services around here in Eastern Europe: health care, education and housing. All incredibly bad and expensive, I pay huge chunks of my monthly salary for them and I try to avoid them at all costs. They get worse and more expensive with time too.
All the other services and products I use in my life, from the car I drive to the clothes on my back, the food I eat and the device I write this on are provided by private enterprise and they have become much better and cheaper in my life time.
If you can afford less (lesser treatment, drugs, procedures, quality of doctors and hospitals you can pay for), then your chances of survival also got WAY worse.
Doesn't matter if the 1% has now access to better versions.
Sure, if actual availability of healthcare to an average American has grown worse, that would be a bad result. But that is something you should demonstrate with data instead of just asserting it.
I mean one can go look at the health outcomes of the average american vs other developed nations, and see that we do not get much for the amount of money we spend. I won't bother to argue this with you. If you're genuinely operating in good faith, you're just as capable of finding the studies as I am, and if not, there's really no point
When comparing average Americans and their health to average, say, Spaniards, we should not ignore the 400 lb gorilla in the room named "obesity".
Even Europeans are getting bigger, but America is way, way worse. Seeing those extreme landwhale-type people who cannot even walk around the mall and navigate it using a motorized cart, throwing bulk packages of horrible shitty ultraprocessed food and drinks into said cart, always makes me wonder how the hell is your healthcare system even capable of keeping them alive.
That is nothing short of a miracle, and should be taken into account in all international comparisons.
Does this concern an average American, or mostly the poorest quintile of the population?
We're not discussing whether your healthcare system is friendly to the poor; everyone knows that the US is not particularly kind to its poor, in any aspect.
The original topic was if its overall quality declined in the last decade for the average American, who is not poor.
If it's bad enough 'for the poor' that it's pulling down the average for everyone that's a pretty damning indictment of the system overall is it not?
I'll be honest. I really tire of the mental gymnastics people put themselves through to make excuses for the American system. I don't think we have anything more to discuss here.
I don't have concrete metrics/sources to give right now, but my general perception from reading the news is that there's been staffing issues pushing healthcare systems in the US towards increasing workloads in individual providers, leading to less time/attention given to individual patients, lower availability of appointment slots, and offloading of patients onto alternative app-based telehealth platforms, which have been trending up alongside aquisition/consolidation of independent private practices.
Staffing problems are absolutely everywhere, regardless of the particular healthcare system or even political system. Czechia, the UK, China, Japan. It seems to be a global trend, much like falling birthrates.
I mean, yeah, that was the point of my original reply: health care, education and housing have been getting less accessible in general, not just that poster's country. (Or wherever they're from. I checked the comment history and it seems to be 90% talking back to people criticizing capitalism/markets. Wouldn't be my preferred hobby of choice, personally.)
Not a hobby, but a duty. I lived under both systems and I do not wish the horrors I’ve seen in my youth onto my children. Although at this point, it’s probably unavoidable. It seems that some lessons can only be learned by experiencing them, no warning is ever enough: Russia, communism.
Yes, now ask someone from a nordic country about how best to balance capitalism with regulation and social safety nets. I think you'd get a very different answer.
You mean in places where every random without a degree can perform eye surgery, and doesn't matter if one in 5 customers go blind from it? Yes, that sure drops the prices.
But they're way cheaper than the US in heavily and properly regulated health markets too.
You'll forgive me if perhaps I want something as important as eye surgery to be well regulated. Have a look at health outcomes for literally any industry where regulation is lax, like Brazilian plastic surgery. It's not great.
Sure, I totally get you. Then higher costs, lower availability and crappier services (all due to less competition and more bureaucratic hoops) is a price you should be happily willing to pay.
