Letter from Beijing, with Han Feizi — Manifold #72
Han Feizi is the pseudonym of a columnist for Asia Times, who covers the Chinese economy, technology, and US-China competition. The author lives in Beijing, and has an extensive background in finance and investment banking.
Han Feizi's articles for Asia Times: https://asiatimes.com/author/han-feizi/
Chapters:
(00:00) - Introduction to the guest: Han Feizi
(01:39) - What it's like in Beijing right now
(06:38) - Modern Conveniences in Beijing
(12:11) - What the economy feels like for ordinary people
(19:09) - China's economic structure: consumption, infrastructure investment, Michael Pettis
(30:32) - Currency Valuation and PPP: real PRC is significantly larger than the US
(31:45) - US high living standards and manufacturing competitiveness
(34:13) - Globalization and its discontents
(40:15) - Reversing globalization and the myth of American exceptionalism
(45:58) - China's increasingly high quality standards and quality of life
(58:09) - Whither China? Xi Jinping
Audio-only version and transcript:
https://www.manifold1.com/episodes/letter-from-beijing-with-han-feizi-72
Can you talk about Chinese photonic chips in a future podcast? I think many people would appreciate.
If you're open to requests, I would be interested in learning more about air defense systems. In particular, I'm curious about the physics of missile defense. Intuitively it makes sense to me that the interceptor needs to have more energy than whatever missile it's pursuing. I'd be interested to see the actual math.