The problem is, modern Chinese food rely too much on MSG(or its alternatives, along with chilies), it has its justification that Chinese are only relative rich recently, that people needed a way to make cabbages and other non-meat stuff tasty, in this sense, Chinese food is defined by it, unfortunately. I honestly can't imagine how they tasted way back then, coz it must be awful.
But the thing is MSG is like drugs, you seemingly need ever more of it. That's why I don't really like modern Chinese eateries, they might taste fantastic, but I know they are constantly search for the next MSG-derivative that can "wow" people(in fact MSG is realy outdated, it's mowhere to been seen in China now, there are countless stronger synthetic flavor "essence" in the market.)
I actively avoid it myself, dishes just taste fake, only add it when like I'm doing a seaweed soup.
Is it "recruiting"? If so it starts at higher education, "good" students can apply for party membership, which is a prerequisite for lush and comfy gov jobs.
And any org that employs 3+ party members shall set up a party chamber, host party sessions and even appoint a sectary.
This executive very likely is a party member, but that doesn't necessarily make this act party related, more and more Chinese have come to defend the 1989 event(if they know it ofc), as China is now on a peak, what the party did back then is gaining legitimacy and praises.
I won't be surprised if he had done this out of his own volition, and probably most of the people in his position would have done the same.
The HK protests were overwhelmingly disapproved and regared as "abject-lowlife riots", in some way, it reflects the public sentiment toward that 1989 event.
Any person with Chinese lineage is considered "our guy" obligated to do good to the homeland, or else they are traitors even if they never touch on Chinese soil. This sentiment is not limited to lineage and nationality but also surnames, birthing place and ethnicity.
Recent examples：
>Mike Pompeo’s China adviser has name chiselled off school monument
>removed his name from the genealogical chart of the “Yu Clan.”
Seems like you haven't been to South Korea for example. I see makeup shops literally on every corner, tremendous mall culture (which is sort of dying in America) and highend stores are jam-packed with newly minted millionaires.
Not to say Americans don't love to spend, I think America has exported this culture to the rest of the world which is that every holiday is an opportunity for sale, put debt on credit card and get addicted to the dopamine rush of shopping. I don't think its unique to America anymore.
There is no need for the shopping culture to be imported anywhere, it already existed pretty much everywhere. Just check out the malls in the first world and the local markets in the less developed places
I think the difference here is that is this of "everyday people" or just high-earners, Costco only has several stores in China and remains a high-end exotic market, drones are still expensive "toys" here, new iphones often cost a month's salary or more.
The drone makers have a reason to be amused at how much Americans love their products.
I recently learned that Etsy actively terminates sellers based in China, seemingly indiscriminately, the message is quite clear that they just don't want to do this kind of business, unlike Amazon.
And for good reason; a big, if not THE biggest problem that Etsy has at the moment is that people's designs are blatantly getting stolen and reproduced at a fraction of the creators' price. There's a lot of pressure on Etsy to combat that. This is where copyright and (?) design patent laws come into effect as well.
People are trying to make a living by crafting things, and the free market is swooping in by undercutting them with a race to the bottom.
I feel like there could be a better version of this. Like an Etsy, but with support for creators, so that when demand reaches a certain threshold, the platform could offer support with scaling and industrializing the product, for a share of the profit. Essentially the same process, but actually rewarding the market-maker.
The big diffrence is debit card-based and credit card-based, Ant and Chinese banks take no responsibility of these one-off domestic transations and offer no consumer protection, while western banks need to worry about money-laundering and terrorism and risk management. WeChat Pay don't even offer customer support.
It's this special gated environment enabled payment tools, they just process this money and be done with it. Alipay & Wechat and Chinese banks don't care about what is your business doing are they shady or not, unlike Paypal.
China's anti money-laundering law wasn't as strict as US's for sure, but that doesn't mean huge amount of cash flow from one or many accounts to another wouldn't draw red flags.
US banking system works that anyone can use the card even if they just found it on the street, and business owner can charge a card repeatedly for any amount even if the card owner is not present. The room for fraud is huge.
China's debit and credit card alike requires PIN code to send payment, where the owner would be required to confirm the number and enter the PIN code. And it has 2FA as a requirement for online banking, whether that's a text message received on a mobile phone, or a hardware 2FA. There is still room for fraud but a lot smaller.
To say US banks cares and Alipay, Wechat and Chinese banks don't care is kind of absurd. They exist in a almost entirely different financial ecosystem and norms. In the US, fraud protection is necessary otherwise no one would use their cards. While in China, fraud protection still needed, but rarely is the case. Those institutions only did what's necessary.
I don’t believe this for a split second. I’m certain China cares if money being spent somehow harms the CCP. Their monitoring motivations are distinct from the west, but monitoring definitely exists.
You don't have to, it's just the way banking is done in China, sounds ridiculous?
Well, having banks blocking you transaction, and asking what it's for is it legitmate, or Paypal terminating accounts at will is ridiculous in China too, "it's my money none of your business". Also part of the reason why mobile games and micro-transation are so huge, there's no bank asking why are you spending repeatedly on Genshin Impact and do you want to take it back.
It's tied to your national ID for sure, but it stops there.
It's actually good for the CCP, coz corruption is lubricant and everybody is in it, you don't want to track who's behind this money, they don't even disclose how many dozen condos every official owns.
Banks in US only block payments if they look like they might contravene US laws. China will have different laws, but moving large sums of money without reason is likely to raise flags over there too. According to your post, a Chinese bank will allow me to withdraw a million yuan in cash in one go without asking why and what I need it for. I find that difficult to believe.
No one tracks micro transactions, not in the States or anywhere. AML laws don’t kick in until 10K USD. And of course corruption is a problem in China. It’s also a problem in the States. None of these statements point to a crucial difference in banking. If anything a commercial bank in the US is far more likely to keep your transactions private, whereas a Chinese bank probably hands them over to the government as a pre-arranged periodic data dump.
It's not uncommon, there are various scams esp around e-commerce review boosting gigs that trick you into paying upfront but into different accounts/scan alternate QR codes, once the money is transfered, it's very hard to get it back if not impossible.
The police don't really pursue these cases as the debit card money is all instant and already gone and often small in amount (won't even register it as a case if the money is less than 450 USD), occasionally they will do a blanket operation and arrest some unlucky scammers to make an example, simmilar to irl thefts.
If your are talking about account hacking, SIM swap is quite difficult in China as basically anything is tied to national ID nowadays (even posting comments online, this does provide security to their business model, not to mention they are aggressively pushing facial recognition on the app level, I have to install a local police station app to unlock front door that regularly scans my face and tied to my WeChat, they are conducting census through WeChat BTW), but there are methods such as basestation jamming to force phones back into 2G and intercept text messages, these are fairly uncommon.
As I've said, many of the hard work has already been done by the state or isn't required at all, it's realy a paradise environment for these payment tools, probably only in China.
If I have $100,000 USD equivalent in yuan in a Chinese bank account and try to have it transferred overseas in one go, they will certainly ask me questions. Similarly if I suddenly try to withdraw that amount in cash, I will be queried as well.
Ergo, as long as limits and thresholds exist, the banking systems are equivalent, and all we are left to quibble over is the what (or how much) and the why.
You simply can't do that, Yuan is nowhere near a freely convertible currency, it's a fundamental difference.
Once foreign money enters China, it's very hard to get it out, the CCP has a ministry dedicated to the control of it. Most of the people don't have the need for it.
What you are saying is irrelevant to Ant and banks in general. Ant doesn't care about foreign markets or your dollars, it's a Yuan-only payment tool operates inside mainland China for Chinese people, simple as that.
It's not, the banks lend their excessive cash to a big tech company, Ant then use that money to make small/short-term loans with "big data" credit ratings to individuals unqualified for low-interest bank loans.
Its gigantic valuation most likely will face a harsh test, one that the fragile domestic market can hardly afford, a risk that worries the administration who has been desperately propping it up that also hopes it can fund China's tech self-reliance. Such listings didn't bode well in the past, with SMIC being the lastest example.
At its core, Ant is more of a lending company, re-distributing money it got from banks at much higher interest rates (typically 15%, some banks offer personal credit loans at around 4%) and leverage. Tho it insists on it's high-tech, in order to boost valuation and avoid financial regulation, but how many more debt can the population pile on itself?
Sidenote: Its business model profits from people that traditional banks snubed, mostly from lower social classes.
In India, we called them moneylenders and it carries a jail term to engage in such activities. Good to see Wall Street and the West lap up such usurious companies.
IPO at its relative late stage with a gigantic valuation, leaving little for retail investors to gain from. And its whole IPO process is preferential treatment at its finest, almost looked like Jack Ma can do whatever he wanted.
Ant and Ma's condescending posture did draw a fairly big backlash, it's certain pratices border on non-compliance, and Ma's beneficiaries are mostly from the last leadership, these probably helped put a brake on it.
> The IPO was a sensational draw for China’s retail investors who bid a record $3 trillion, equivalent to the entire annual economic output, for shares in the fintech giant.
Americans markets have been booming for the past 10 years, relatively robust and "policed", it also has something to do with the dollar dominance, so they kind of can take these bets?
But it's not the case for Chinese domestic markets.
But the thing is MSG is like drugs, you seemingly need ever more of it. That's why I don't really like modern Chinese eateries, they might taste fantastic, but I know they are constantly search for the next MSG-derivative that can "wow" people(in fact MSG is realy outdated, it's mowhere to been seen in China now, there are countless stronger synthetic flavor "essence" in the market.)
I actively avoid it myself, dishes just taste fake, only add it when like I'm doing a seaweed soup.