China’s youth unemployment rate is 15%, and that’s likely heavily astroturfed to look lower than it is. Even 15% though is terrifying for a mature economy.
China's one-child policy is finally starting to hit, and its population is actively shrinking. At the moment China is not in a crisis yet, as its GDP is still growing quite well - so clearly there's plenty of economic activity.
So if a lot of old people are now retiring, and the young can't find jobs, who is doing the work? China is still a factory powerhouse, so who's screwing together the gadgets?
The answer is that they have been pushing heavily for automation, and it is working. Our biggest chance of beating China on a free market was domestic automation versus cheap overseas labor - but they have gotten there first. And that should be absolutely terrifying you.
Like ours would if we had 15% youth unemployment.
Maybe we’re projecting our values?
https://www.dongascience.com/en/news/75540
China leads in 66 of 74 critical tech areas. The USA has a whopping... 8.
But hey, the USA's MBA "leadership" figures how much to worsen everything and extract more profit. I guess that counts for "innovation", in the Private Equity books.