Golly. I guess the "china model" ain't all it's cracked up to be after all, unless you're in a position to benefit from the built in corruption. Funny, seems like the US ain't in all that different a state of affairs. There's a moral to the story, I'm just sure of it!
I believe this is true. The development in China over the last 10 years has been insanely fast, and the speculation in real estate has been massive. Local governments simply keep building and building, and many of these structures are well below occupancy. Infrastructure is being built at an astronomical rate without real demand. The only demand here is speculation. It's like Dubai. I hate to say it, because I love China and go there a lot, but the country has a deep culture of corruption. My personal view is that the absurdity of communism forced everyone to learn to live two ways: you present a public way, and you practice a private way. This corruption is diminishing, but it is still ever-present. Regional governors lying to the gentral government goes way back. It was a primary cause of the famine following the Great Leap Forward: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Leap_Forward#Famine Although actual harvests were reduced, local officials, under tremendous pressure from central authorities to report record harvests in response to the new innovations, competed with each other to announce increasingly exaggerated results. These were used as a basis for determining the amount of grain to be taken by the State to supply the towns and cities, and to export. This left barely enough for the peasants, and in some areas, starvation set in. During 1958–1960 China continued to be a substantial net exporter of grain, despite the widespread famine experienced in the countryside, as Mao sought to maintain face and convince the outside world of the success of his plans. There is a real absurdity to that economy, and a reality check will come a some point.
Japan, in the go-go '80s when the Yakuza were really flourishing, also had massive real estate speculation. The quasi-legality of it all amplified the effect. The Tongs, meanwhile, have grown rather nicely under the westernization of China: http://www.amazon.com/Blood-Brothers-Criminal-Underworld-Asi... China, in a nutshell, is a managed central government attempting to take a billion people from feudalism to capitalism in three generations. I'm unaware of any other sociopolitical work of that magnitude in the history of the world. As a result, when they fuck up they fuck up royally. The Chinese real estate market is an excellent example. At the same time, no other economy can go "you know what? We're going to take a couple steps back towards feudalism" to solve their problems. People will starve, exports will crash, dissidents will be executed and thousands will die in coal mines but that's kind of how China rolls. China did say "you're on your own guys" when the EU asked them to add liquidity to the Greek crisis. Anybody credible can see that China is in a bubble (Mauldin has blinders on).
I wonder if this might be changing, however. A lot of very wealthy Chinese are now traveling about the world, and have been for the last several years. Their expectations have changed. Also, there are a lot of entrepreneurs that are now symbols of national pride. If government starts to rain on this parade, this time, the CCP might look like the a jealous and ineffective player that is holding China back. Personally, I doubt the CCP will survive the coming downturn.
When I was there last year, one of our cabbies launched an anti-government tirade, blaming them for inflation and the high cost of housing. -That would not have happened 10 years ago. I think because the government likes to be the authority on so much, they also get to take the blame for so much.
My sense of the PRC is that it's a managed economy where they're doing their level best to bridge the 14th and 21st centuries as quickly as they can; if that means getting medieval from time to time, it's par for the course.
At any rate, I'm pretty sure that we are going to see something interesting in the next several years. My wife was apolitical in China, but I think I've biased her here. :)