Transcription
And on the front of authoritarianism in the United States, I felt threatened like go outside. Guard is up. I call my mom. She lives in a small town in America. She doesn't go out at night. She's afraid to. She lives in a, you know, one of those picturesque small American towns where everyone knows everyone. She doesn't go out after dark.
But like in China, you know, a 12-year-old girl could go out running in the streets by herself in any city in China and be perfectly safe. My wife goes out in any any hour, any city. I go out alone. I never really am a self-aware anymore. And it didn't occur to me until years after living in China that there's no street crime. But in in the United States, you know, I was robbed at gunpoint by three children one time. So like there's a stark difference.
So when people talk about freedom, I feel far freer in China. I'm free from crime. People are free from poverty. People are free from homelessness. People are, you know, free from debt. I mean, there are so many ways that in China, people are much freer than they are in the United States.
Would you have freedom from wage [music] slavery and join in the grand industrial hands? [music] Would you [singing] from misery and hunger be free [music] and come do you share thy command? [music] There is [singing] power. There is power [music] in a band of working. [music] That's a power. That's a power that [music] must rule in every land. [music] Would you have mansions [singing] of gold in the sky and a [music] thin shank way out in the back? Would you have wings up in [singing] heaven to fly [music] and starve here with rags on your back? There [music] is power. There is power in a band [music] of working men. That's a [music and singing] power. That's a power that [singing] must rule in every land. [music] [music] If you had enough of the blood [music and singing] of the lamb, then join the grand industrial [music] band. If you'd rather feast off your [singing] own land, then [music] come do your share like a man. There's power. >> There's power [music] in [singing] working. [music] There's power. There's power [music] that across the land. [music] [music] [music] Heat. [music] [music] Heat. >> [music] [music] >> Come all you workers from every land. Then join the grand inspe [music] [singing] [music] [music] of working man. [music] There is power. >> There is power. >> There is power. >> There is power [music] >> that will rule >> in every land. >> There is power. >> There is power. >> There's this power that will rule >> in every land.
Welcome everyone to another episode of Escaping the Cave with Dr. Gerrio. I have the pleasure of being joined today by Jason Smith, an American journalist that has been living in China for a few years. He's also a quite prolific author. He has a few books uh on the way and he's also the author of a world beyond poverty which discusses u some of the ways in which China was able to lift uh what is it almost 900 million people out of absolute poverty at this point a world historic feat Jason thank you so much for being here.
>> I'm delighted to be here professor thank you for having me.
>> I want to start by asking you what brought you uh to China because you've been there for a few years and uh as someone who's been active active now on the media for like six, seven years. It's been very recent that we've seen a complete change in how Americans are receiving uh China. I would say in the last two years is when you start to see quite a few edits of these massive cities in China that look like they're hundred if not more years ahead. And you know, the the soft power, as they call it, of China has really increased very recently. But what drew you, you know, so many uh years ago uh to China?
>> You know, I have a lot of different answers to that, so I can't give all of them here, otherwise it would be wasting your fans time. But I'll say that life in America was getting hard for the middle class, and I was experiencing that. I had a master's degree. The jobs were not looking good. They weren't paying enough to live well. And I thought, you know, this isn't the case everywhere in the world. Why should I tolerate this? So, I jumped ship. I'm glad that people like you are still there fighting the good fight to make it better for the working class, but I to chose the selfish route and went somewhere where I could have a better life.
>> Yeah, that seems to be the case for a lot of Americans. I love watching people from the West, not just Americans. There's a few um there's a few uh British people that I see who have uh some of my favorite vlogging channels in China. It seems like it's pretty basic. You know, it's the same logic that at one point in history brought people to America. You know, uh they saw it as the land of opportunities, the place where they can actually have a comfortable life and get ahead and if they worked hard can actually secure security, right? And it seems like there's a whole lot of Americans that are seeing that today in China. Uh how have you seen in the By the way, how many years have you been there? Is it five or six?
>> Uh I've been in China for 13 years going on 14 soon.
>> 13 years. Okay. Okay. Wow. Um how so you've seen a very drastic change I I think in the western attitude towards China in these last few years.
>> Oh that and China itself China has transformed in that time in addition to the fact that perceptions of China have changed like you've just mentioned.
>> What uh what would you say is the biggest change at the level of how people view China?
>> Well you know it's hard harder for me to see that. It's easier for you to see that from the United States. I only get information about, you know, what the tone is in America from watching your channel, other people's channels, the news, and so forth. It seems like uh when I first arrived in China, when I left the United States in 2012 to move here, people did really just didn't know much about China at all. I mean, my grandmother said, "You know, they're communists." Like concerned for me. She says, "Don't go. They're communists." So, I was like, "I know they're communist, grandma. That's why I'm going." But I I went to, you know, but like, you know, most people didn't have any notion of what China was other than like food and like maybe music and Chinese New Year or something like that. Uh when I But I think around Trump's first term, it seemed like the tone shifted in the United States and there was a lot of anti-China hysteria even way before the pandemic, years before the pandemic began. And that's when I got into media and it wasn't really, you know, deliberate or anything. I just saw that US media was telling a a wrong story, an incorrect false story about China and I wanted to set the record straight and that's why I do what I do.
>> That's very interesting. One of the channels that I watch, I think the the channel's name is Living in China. I don't know if you're familiar with it, but he's a a British.
>> Patrick.
>> Oh, no.
>> I'm not sure. I don't know his actual name, but I've been.
>> Jason Lightfoot.
>> Okay. Okay.
>> Yeah. uh his his his clickbait stuff is actually hilarious when he compares Chinese trains to American trains and.
>> streets and crimes and all. It's very funny. Um, but I if I recall correctly, that's um that's one of the things he emphasized too. Um, that what led him to actually start making videos and recording this stuff is just this experience of the contrast that you're actually uh the contrast between what you're seeing on the media depicted about where you're living and then what you're actually seeing in the world itself. One of the biggest hiccups that I see Americans always ask about when they talk about China is that they have this very um almost like um I I think it's I think it's stopping with the Gen Z, but this very libertarian attitude that's like their main framework of thinking about politics is authoritarianism, anti- athoritarianism. And it's very weird because as you I'm sure know every state has different forms of authoritarianism that work towards some end or others in order to benefit one class or another. Um and they have this very abstract perspective of of how society works. But [snorts] the I think the younger generation is actually changing a bit. We we're speaking of them now as like regime pill. They love the DPRK edits. They love the China edits. Uh but one of the things that most Americans still have a hiccup on with China is this dystopian picture that's painted about the social uh credit uh system, the social credit score. Um what's going on there? As someone who's been there for 13, 14 years, is there a social credit uh score? Uh does it work like any of the things that the Western media depicts it as?
There is no such thing as a national social credit score in I want to talk about this a few different angles because this comes up so often and this is what a lot of people are misinformed and some people are mis some people are misinforming and disinforming because they care you know a lot of Americans are really moral people actually and when they see something that looks bad they want to call it out and that's like how they get manipulated actually because of the moral character of so many Americans of tens of millions a couple hundred million Americans who really honestly care about what's going on in the world, they are then manipulated because they're told things that are not true and then they want to stop that evil thing. There are a couple tiny little uh cities or provinces over the last 10 years who've tried like uh punishing jaywalkers by showing their face on a sign and stuff like that, but there's no national social credit scheme of any kind whatsoever. uh what there is is there are punishing people especially uh very rich people who own companies who have not paid their employees. So in the case where people have liquidity, so someone who owns a company, they have 50 employees at a factory, they didn't pay them. Well, they're brought before a judge and they're h have some liberties, we'll call them that, to use US lingo, taken away like you can't stay at a five-star hotel, you can't stay fly first class, you can't take a first class train. So like these people have certain limits until they pay those employees, debtors, you know, big debtors, rich debtors, but nothing for anyone else. And then, you know, there is a there are credit scores in specific apps like WeChat, you know, uh has its own credit score. So, if you don't pay your DD driver, which is China's Uber, >> you may not be able to when you go to check out one of those phone battery chargers from the airport or something, be able to check it out until you pay your debt and your score goes down because you forgot to pay a debt. But like that only affects really small things like opening the refrigerators in the park that have like drinks in them where you just take whatever you want. Stuff like that. It doesn't affect anything else. I mean, the real draconian credit system is the one that exists in the United States where if you have a bad credit score, you can't rent an apartment and in some cases you can't even get some kinds of jobs. Nothing like that. Nothing that draconian exists in China.
And on the front of authoritarianism, uh, you know, in the United States, I felt threatened like go outside, guard is up. I call my mom. She lives in a small town in America. She doesn't go out at night. She's afraid to. She lives in a, you know, one of those picturesque small American towns where everyone knows everyone. She doesn't go out after dark. But like in China, you know, a 12-year-old girl could go out running in the streets by herself in any city in China and be perfectly safe. Like my wife goes out in any any hour, any city. I go out alone, any I never really am a self-aware anymore. And it didn't occur to me until years after living in China that there's no street crime. But in in the United States, you know, I was robbed at gunpoint by three children one time. So like there's a stark difference. So when people talk about freedom, I feel far freer in China. I'm free from crime. People are free from poverty. People are free from homelessness. People are, you know, free from debt. You know, in the United States, what what is it? $1.8 trillion in student loans. If you miss those student loans, your credit crashes, you know, then you're on the line. You're going to become homeless because you can't your credit goes down. Can you rent a place? I mean, there are so many ways that in China, people are much freer than they are in the United States.
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>> I want to add one small caveat because you study philosophy. I think that's what you teach. uh in philos in the philosophy of China the government should disappear into the background this is a confusion idea this is an idea in the daqing that a really good government system disappears like it shouldn't be people shouldn't be actively aware of it if it's doing its job no one should even notice it and that's really the case in China everything is getting better all of the time uh small things can be handled if you want to make a complaint you can call one 12345 on the phone and make a complaint or you can go to a CPP DPCC office or an NPC office and complain about something, a law you want changed or a pothole in your community. If you call 1 2 3 4 5 and complain a pot about a pothole in your community, it will be gone next week. I mean, so like uh the whole authoritarianism thing doesn't fly once you actually come to China and see China. And I think uh those people who are saying that China is anything but like let's just say it's a better model than the United States. I love the people of the United States. And I think that we can do better. And what one of the things I like to point out in China is like, you know, not everything's perfect, but hey, you know what? That's better. Why don't we try that? And I think that's a lot of what I do online now because there are a lot of things there are a lot of lessons that China has for us in the United States.
>> Yeah. There's so much to break down there. It's interesting like what authoritarianism can you like the authoritarianism that forces you to not look over your shoulder when you're out in the street. I mean [laughter] the one that removes the adrenaline when you're out at night and you're scared of getting robbed at gunpoint or something. It's that the authoritarianism that you know maybe these guys want to live in like the Wild West and that's uh the big China state is repressing their ability to just be gunslinging. But yeah, it's it fundamentally comes down to different conceptions of of liberty, right? Um, China doesn't defend the liberty of people to just janisfacely uh exploit and and debt and and trap their workers and not pay them and do all these things. Yeah. There the state will crack down. And guess what? I think if most Americans understood that that's how the social credit uh uh scores and social credit system works, they would support it. This is the interesting thing I find that you know you mentioned this important uh distinction that exists of course between the American government and the American people. I think if the American people actually knew what the hell China was like they would think it's more American than the US government in terms of the ideals that they have uh conjoined to what they understand themselves uh as Americans through. You know, for for the American people, the idea of a government of by and for the people, which was popularized by Lincoln's Gettysburg address, is how they understand democracy, but you have a hell of a lot more of that in China where you what you said is not false. I've seen so many videos of people, even tourists that are not Chinese citizens, 1 2 3 4 5 there's a pothole. It's gone within a day or two. There's potholes all around the country that have been there for decades and there's not even mechanisms through which to get these things uh fixed. The people are completely left behind. And so any American that looks at China that's able to actually see China would realize not only is this infinitely better, but the things that we already agree on uh at least at the level of what our ideals are, China embodies them a hell of a lot uh more than the US. one of the more provocative statements I I made when I was over there. I was interviewed by Beijing Review and I said China's more American than the US itself, which sounds kind of crazy at face value, but it's true. When I get there, uh I got there in Beijing at night uh maybe 9 10:00 and we're on the uh taxi or whatever the DD to to get to get to the hotel and I saw like 10 women walking alone. I'm like, what is this? It was astonishing because you just don't see that in the US. Like you're, you know, that women are taught from a very early age like don't walk alone at night. It's extremely unsafe. Even in some of the safest places, even in suburbs, you know, you're uh recommended to not do that. But in China, in a central city, uh here they were, a lot of them were young and it's like what's going on here? And that's real freedom. You know, that security that the Chinese people have is is real freedom.
One of the things you mentioned um just a moment ago is that so much in China not just about the perception of China but in China itself has changed in the last 13 14 years and it was somewhat recently uh that they were able to fully abolish absolute uh poverty. You know we've I've personally have repeated it so much in the last few years that uh it I sometimes forget how recent it was. And I was uh just to tell you a quick story before I formulate the question. I I was taken to Nshi uh China in the Hubet province I believe if I'm not mistaken. I was told it was one of the poorest cities in central China. So I was like well I've made a lot of videos about China. I've done the whole Shenzen and all the nice lights and stuff uh in Shanqing and and uh but I I had no idea existed. Uh they said the poorest city in central China is waiting for like dirt roads and to see places that looked like some of the poorest places in America. I get there and I'm like what the [ __ ] is this? This is like a lot nicer, cleaner, better looking, more developed looking than probably all of the cities I've had a chance to see in the US. And I was taken the day after I got there to the countryside and I was like, "All right, now is when I'm going to see the hard stuff." No, it was beautiful mountains. The apartment buildings were developed, very modern looking with a Chinese twist. And then I got to speak to some of the people which were um part of this uh tea commune. And you can tell that they came from poverty, the older ones. They're missing teeth. You can tell they came from poverty. But they were lifted out of poverty seven out of absolute poverty seven years seven years prior. And so in just seven years a place that was in absolute poverty is you you don't even see traces of poverty except in the people. Um so how how have you seen in the last like 14 years uh this process of poverty alleviation?
>> You know it was a few years ago that I started going to the rural areas of China more frequently. I had been before but I I started showing all of the amazing cities online. I started I I was one of the first people started showing the Chinese skyline, you know, I have drones and stuff and a lot of people said, "Oh, you know, go outside of the city and you're going to see all this poverty." I was like, "Okay." So, I started going to these poverty alleviation villages or villages throughout Habe and and Shinszang and Shi Shiang, also known as Tibet and many other provinces all over China. And I started just going to all kinds of villages. And the story is the same everywhere where at some point in the past whether it was 20 years ago or 10 years ago or 5 years ago that village had been impoverished like truly kind of at poverty that you would expect to find I don't know in Somalia today and so like uh most of these places have new apartments built in some area and people have been relocated or they have had their apartments upgraded or China has strategically located jobs like solar energy field fields or some kind of new factory or near them or like provided or what they have is they sit down with them in a communal environment sometimes when they're an agricultural community they say what do you want and we'll help you facilitate that and in a lot of cases they still want to do agriculture so they'll bring aronomists in from the big cities in China and they will actually teach them how to do crops better or maybe they switch crops and some people don't want So what you'll see is a lot of cases in one year half of the farmers will switch to some new cash crop and they'll become much more uh prosperous and then one or two years later everyone ends up switching to that cash crop and so then you just see people raised out of poverty by themselves. China is not seeking to just give hands out handouts. China does do that. China does provide low-income housing and and food and basic uh medical for people who are in impoverished conditions. However, the goal of the Chinese government is to help people escape poverty by their own labor. I mean, China is basically built around the concept of workers. So, we have to constantly think about that. China's usually looking for some kind of work to help people facilitate their own exit from poverty. Let me give you a couple of examples. One example is in Shinjzyang. I went to a place where people were farmers, but the whole area was being eaten alive by the desert. This is an area called outside of Oxu. It's in the countryside outside of of Au Prefecture or in the in the countryside of Oxu, right on the edge of the Taklamakan desert. Well, China, as we know, is desertification or aforesting. And so, China planted all these popppler trees everywhere to actually stop desertification. And then inside pockets of these popppler trees, which are really tall trees to block the wind, they started uh this started in 1986 in this case, uh they actually started doing farming. So you go out and you actually, you know, reach down to the ground and pull up sand, but then they're growing things like tomatoes or apples and all kinds of crazy stuff like just out of this new new arable land. And then China will also create these vocational centers that are voluntary that people go to and learn to upgrade their product. So, okay, you have a farm or your community, your commune has a farm and you grow apples. Well, now they teach you how to make applesauce and apple juice. They teach you how to to put it in different bottles that look cute, the kind of stuff that people want to buy or make, you know, all kinds of added value products, dried apples, uh, etc. And then they give everyone telecom. So they roll in the 5G towers and then they teach everyone how to use >> cell phones and they give them training how to do logistics, how to find the right shipping company. Don't sell to your local community when you can sell nationally or internationally. So then suddenly these small small agrarian communities become national enterprises and this commune just the money starts rolling in and pretty soon everyone's living you know a far more prosperous life and then of course their kids have access to education because they're building schools everywhere you know like in United States we take for granted that we've had schools for decades and decades and decades and decades but in China some schools are just popping up in the last couple of decades and so th those kids now have the opportunity to go to university in the next generation or not, you know, or stay in their agrarian community if they want. But what they also have is if you come from a poor community in China, you get higher status for getting into a better university. If you come from an ethnic minority in China, you get higher status for going to a university. So kids in Shinjang, for example, or Shiang, they uh when they're applying to university, there's a far higher chance for them to get into the best universities in China. And we're already seeing a lot of them returning back to become entrepreneurs in their own communities and help those communes even become wealthier.
So another aspect you mentioned uh well how has it changed in the last >> if I can real quick Jason?
>> Go ahead. Yes.
>> I want to emphasize what you said about the 5G towers guys. Oh yeah.
>> It's become a running joke with me and my wife >> every time even at home the wife is so the Wi-Fi is so bad in the US any major city. It it doesn't matter where you're at. its ass. And I was in the mountains of rural Anshi, China, and I was able to send like 30 videos through Telegram in like seconds. The most insane and advanced and quick and efficient Wi-Fi I've ever seen. So, I I can I can absolutely vouch for that. It's become such a central part of like the running jokes I make uh with my wife all the time. But uh please continue.
I just wanted to mention in the cities, you know, going back to the urban areas which are 67.79% of the population now because China's trying to move people from the rural areas into the cities for a better life for access to hospitals, you know, better schools and so forth. Uh when I arrived 14 years ago, there was an enormous amount of construction going on. You go to cities like uh in Dong Bay, for example, northeastern China, and the whole city was just a construction zone. And you know, you flash forward to 2020 or 2021 and the most of the construction is dying down and moving out to moving further into rural areas and the cities are just done. So, there was a very long 20-year construction process that took place in urban areas and you're seeing the outcome of that is these hyper modern cities and just amazing infrastructure.
>> Yeah. The images that come out, it's it's almost hard to believe. Um, I know uh the most popular one is perhaps uh Shong Shing. I don't know if that's how you pronounce it. Uh but I mean the the cyberpunk city it's so it's almost surreal especially uh for people from from the United States cuz it's got to be tough cuz the contrast between what you've been told about China the image you have about China and what you're seeing now uh with people traveling there people who are not like that's the other thing the western media says anyone who depicts the Chinese uh state of affairs favorably it's a chill a shill of the government or some [ __ ] No, these are like regular people like people that are not political or if they are, you know, they a lot of them are not communists or anything like that, but they're showing up to China and all they got to do is pull out their phone and everyone is is able to freely see like the truth. And um how how surreal was it uh for you in 2020 2021 when this whole scheme of the so-called weaguer genocide started popping up all over uh the west um with basically no foundation uh behind it. How did you get to experience any of that con uh contrast or were you too far from Shing Jang?
Again, I want to go back to the morality of regular Americans, which is why they're so easy. We are so easily manipulated. We care. We want to save people. You know, we have this complex, you know, some call it a white savior complex, but you know, Americans of all ethnicities care about people who are oppressed. So, I went to Sheena every single year when this started really ratcheting up. And my goal was to find minorities, learn about Shinszang, see, you know, can they speak their language? Can are there radio stations where they can hear their language and music uh are there TV stations where they can hear their language? What I I was really surprised because it wasn't just like a little bit. It was shocking the level of how like nothing the West said even remotely was close to the truth. It was all just total deception. So, I arrived in Arumchi, I guess, 2022 for the first time to start, you know, going every year, which I'm also going this year. I'm going to go every single year. Um, and the first thing I noticed going from the airport, well, even in the airport, in the airport and then going to the hotel was all the signs everywhere are bilingual in Han Hanza, which is Chinese Mandarin and uh, weaguer. Every sign, every public sign, every menu sign, elevator warning signs, everything is bilingual. And you see people dressed up in jeans and t-shirts like they do in the West. and weaguer people. You can tell that they're not the same as Han. And they're dressed up as in western clothes, but they're also sometimes dressed up in their their traditional clothes. And there were mosques. I was at a very high floor. I'm looking around the city. It's not just one or two mosques. The whole city is littered. Well, that's not the right word. There there are lots of mosques throughout the city. And every.
>> Doesn't it have the highest density of mosques of any place in the world?
>> That's correct. And China has the most mosques of any country in the world, I think. I think it's something like 38,000 mosques in China. You I mean you just next time you're in China, anyone in you're in China, you're in Shanghai, you're in Beijing, you're in any city, pull your DD out, >> type in mosque, and you know what? You'll just see like all kinds of bubbles all over the city because China has dowist temples, Buddhist temples, mosques, churches, Catholic churches. There's even a Mormon uh I don't know what it's called, tabernacle. I don't know what it's called. It's in Shanghai. So like there's all kinds you know there's there are religions are allowed if they go through a process of getting approval and and there are thousands of churches and thousands of mosques and thousands of uh dowist temples and thousands of Buddhist temples. My wife is a Buddhist. She has no problem going around saying I'm a Buddhist. I'm a Buddhist in public on social media. It doesn't in our house wherever. It doesn't matter. So you don't have the you don't have the prosperity the prosperity gospel grifters over there that run rampant and just.
>> Have you heard about the prosperity gospel people in the in the US south?
>> People like Joel or something?
>> No. No. It's worse. They're like uh Christians who believe that uh the more wealth the preacher has, the more favored he is by God. It's like a very Calvinist uh thing.
>> And uh it's it's become a meme. They're like these mega churches that is is basically just a grift for the preacher to get like extremely rich.
>> Well, I mean I'm I'm I am certain that there are wealthy Buddhists and wealthy Buddhist uh temples for sure. If you go to the uh Shaolin Temple, which is actually a kind of Buddhist temple, >> um they're quite wealthy and you they actually have a list on on on on an obelisk in the in the courtyard of all the people who have donated money and you find people like Robert Downey Jr. has given money to the temple. So like I I can't say that it's not like that entirely. But in Shinzyang, I just want to say I've been all over maybe two dozen cities and towns in Shinszong from the north to the south. There there are weaggguers, there's Kazaks, there's Tuvans, there's Tajiks, there's Russian minorities. It's not even just weaggguers. The whole place is a has a plethora of minority groups alongside the Han majority. So, uh, and all of them, you go to the north where it's Kazak, uh, majority and the signs are bilingual and Kazak and and Hanza. So where you go to Shiang, also known as Tibet, and you see um the signs are bilingual in Tibetan and in Hanza, and you go to other places where Inner Mongolia north of here uh and you see that the the signs are oftentimes in Mongolian and in Hanza, which is really interesting because if you go to the country of Mongolia, they've switched scripts and they don't write in Mongolian, but Mongolian's more well protected in China than in Mongolia. So like uh China is definitely protecting its minorities. Uh you know if there are prisons people have filmed in different provinces those don't necessarily mean that they're rounding people up because of their religions because there are people practicing their faith throughout China. I've been to one of the things that I do as an American who cares every city I went to for a few years every city not even just Shinjang just across China I went to the mosque. I'm not I'm not Muslim, but I care as an American like the Americans back home to go and check. Is it really true? So I went to this city Shening. I went and went to four mosques active. They have the signs for prayer time. You can hear sometimes the sirens going off. It's prayer time. You know, people coming and going from there freely. Like it's clearly the western narrative is just not true. And it the easiest way to see that is just go to Shinjang. You know, you do not need a permit to go to Shinjang. So if you can get come to China, you can go to Shinjzang. If you get a visa to come to China, book a flight. You can go see for yourself. You don't have to take my word for it.
>> Yeah. It's a very weird genocide where like the local governments are like, "Please come and see world. Like please, I beg you, come and see. You'll see with your own eyes how much uh BS is in the Western narratives." Um, what what would you say is still one of the most enduring misunderstanding about uh China that that you know perhaps in social media you see Americans have or something?
you know, it's not even enduring because the narrative, the way that the uh disinformation is created changes, you know, like 10 years ago, no one really cared about homelessness in China. Uh, you know, and there were some homeless actually 10 years ago that I I could see occasionally homeless people, not often, but occasionally. But that kind of disappeared as the poverty alleviation campaign uh wore on and continued and the common prosperity campaign started where the government is actively primarily focused on helping the poorest people in the country. Like in the United States we have this philosophy of uh, you know, bootstrap you know, if oh, you didn't make it that's your fault you didn't try hard enough you weren't smart enough you didn't work hard enough. In China, the government is actively seeking every me means and mechanism to help people raise themselves up, which is, I think, something we can learn in the United States. The government cannot just give people stuff, but give people the ability to start taking care of themselves, give people the means to take care of themselves. And that's what they're doing in China. And so, the homelessness sort of evaporated. But around 2019 2020, again, >> you know, people started looking at the US and saying, "Wow, homelessness is really going up." And that was a global phenomenon. And in China, people noticed too. And at around the same time, I guess it's a deflection, a lot of accounts suddenly started existing in the United States in social media and in other countries uh that suddenly said, "Oh my gosh, China has millions of homeless people. They're sleeping on the streets everywhere, which is not patently not true. Now, maybe there are homeless people in China. In fact, in Beijing, I know where there's one guy uh he lives about 2 kilometers west of here. Not sure where he goes at night, but he's the one guy, homeless guy I know of in Beijing. There may be more, but that's the only one I know of. He's a blind guy who plays Aru for money and he uses a ten can. Uh, but he's the only one that I I know of. And in Wuhan, I know there's at least two or three because I used to live there. There's at least two or three homeless people there that I saw. But, uh, other than that, and I've been to every province in China, every single one. I don't see homeless here. Now, there may be some under a bridge somewhere. Yeah, absolutely. So, when you see a video, I'm not saying that's not true. Maybe there are, but there's not a lot. Not so much that when you go out into society, you just see them everywhere like you do in America. So, I think that this one really bothers me. You know what bothers me and the reason so many of us Westerners who live in China make content about China is we are disturbed by just people lying about the untruth of it all. You know, it's it's it's disturbing when it's gaslighting. People don't like it's not it's not comfortable being gas lit. And I'm in China and I know that the stuff that Western media and some social media accounts are just not true.
>> Oh my god. Yeah. And uh it's so golden that it comes from uh a country that has like 25% of the world's prison population and 4% of the world's population and they want to talk about prisons in China. Really? It's uh I mean the hypocrisy and the double standard is is in full display when you actually know what's going on in uh in China. Um, what would you say that there's also this very interesting thing where because of how duplicitous people understand their governments are in the west they assume that that's just this universal fact. So they'll hear pronunciations by the government of China and comments about common prosperity and whole process, people's democracy and and these different key terms that mark like the focuses that the government is taking in a specific moment and they'll they'll try to look at that cynically and they won't trust it. But it's a distrust that's rooted really in the distrust that they have of their own governments. And what they don't realize is that in China when they say something they do it which guys it might sound insane uh and otherworldly if you're in the US it kind of is otherworldly because it's in China not the US but they really do take serious the plans that they propose the things that they say and uh you know a lot of this goes back to like the power of planning. When I was in uh Enshi, one of the reasons why they were able to be lifted out of poverty was because there's this planning mechanism that the larger cities around it that built wealth first had certain quotas of like tea that they had to buy from the communes and stuff like that, so there was this planning that was structured uh to incentivize the people who are just lifting themselves out of poverty to be able to do so with a little bit of help. And it's not like handouts. Uh like you said, it's like we're creating the conditions so that you can work and get out of this hole. Uh and for that you need opportunities, genuine opportunities, not this herculean feat uh as it is in the US for any person that's born into poverty to get out of it. But um.
>> I mean, go ahead, sir.
>> No, go ahead.
>> I I'm writing a new book. Actually the book you pointed out this book uh world beyond poverty uh is actually about how China is helping people in other countries but I am working on a book like you you mentioned uh that is about how China is helping its local communities each chapter is a different village that I have been to and exa what you're saying is exactly right and oftentimes when a local community doesn't have a lot of resources but has a lot of culture one of the things that they do is they sell that you know be a part of this culture so there's a meow village in uh down down south. I'm not sure. I think it's Guangshi. I'm not sure exactly which province. And uh but I've been there. And they have a rich culture, the Meow people. They're an ethnic minority. And so what they've done is they've sort of transformed part of their community into a tourist attraction. So people from all over the country, we're talking millions of people descend upon this part this part of their village to enjoy their culture. What I like about and so obviously they're wealthy, really wealthy now. The whole area is so wealthy. It's like Disneyland, but they live there. Um, but what's really amazing about this is it's different from the United States in the way that we look at culture. In the United States, one of the things we can learn from China is we tolerate one another. And we look at that as a good thing. Oh, aren't we so good for tolerating someone else? That is a horrible way to think about other people. really. They're not like us, so we need to put up with them. There's something to tolerate. China is the exact opposite. You're from a different culture. Wow, that's amazing. Tell me about your culture here in China. It is a celebration, an appreciation, a love of the minority cultures. And each minority culture has caught on to this and they've turned different parts of their communities throughout China into places where nationally and international tourists can come and spend money. And so they come and spend tons of money and these ethnic minority cultures become rich off of sharing their dance and their music and and showing off their clothes and and and everything. And so I I think that that's something we can learn uh from China that we should be we should love one another. I mean, it seems obvious for people who care about other people that we shouldn't see difference as something to be afraid of or to tolerate, but something that we should learn from, appreciate, and love. And I think that is something that China can definitely teach us.
>> Absolutely. And it's it's I think very important that you mention that because today in the West, you have this resurgence of like a very explicit form of white supremacism. And some of these people very strangely because they can't deny the success of China. They'll turn around and say, "Oh, they're successful because they're a homogeneous country [laughter] because there's just the Han Chinese and the Hanchinese have almost like a white supremacy or Han supremacy and they oppress the rest of the nationalities. And not only is it not the case, not only is that not the case, but as you said, they don't even do.
This is like very liberal, um, act of tolerating. It's like, really, that's, that's how you're going to deal with with others, like, just through tolerance and not like celebrating, learning, um, seeing how you can, uh, you know, take important takeaways and and and celebrate other other cultures.
So, um, I wanted to to ask you about this other popular, um, tagline that shows up whenever, um, whenever people talk about like housing in China. What are ghost towns?
Okay, there's the the most famous one of these is called Ordos. It's in Mongolia. It's the one that CNN and BBC harped on for years. And basically, a lot of uh big companies had a lot of money, SOEs and foreign, you know, direct investment companies. So they were building communities up as fast as they could. There was a really huge rush to build things for like I mentioned before, about 20 years ago started and 10 years ago intensified and and and then, you know, everyone knows that the uh real estate market took a huge downturn a few years ago and that's real and the cost of housing dramatically uh dropped.
So there's so many different things about this that I want to address. So just give me a minute to try to break them down one by one. Number one, in the United States, uh, there's 65% home ownership, mostly by the older generations, but almost all of those homes are owned with the bank in a mortgage. But in China, there's 90% home ownership. And it's only like 20% of those have a mortgage of any kind. And most of those, the interest rates on those are really low, like 3%.
So, um, I think mines in China that they overbuilt because like everyone owns a home that wants to own a home in China. Like I could, if I wanted to, I could go buy multiple homes because they're just so cheap. Now, if you go down downtown Shanghai or down Shenzhen or downtown Beijing, it's expensive. Yeah, it's like very expensive. Could be like a million or $2 million US dollars to buy a nice apartment. But you go anywhere else and they cost nothing. $80,000 for a huge three-bedroom, two bath with two balconies kind of place. I know because I I lived in one. I rented one for $300 a month when I was living in Wuhan. It was spectacular.
So, I mean, uh, and if we want to buy that, that particular one, I think was 800,000 R&B, which is just about $120,000 for just an amazing place in an amazing neighborhood. So, uh, the cost of housing is ridiculously low and everyone can who wants to own a home can own a home. Many people own many homes and very few people have mortgages unless they live in these really expensive areas like downtown Beijing, downtown Shanghai, and so forth.
Now, going specifically to the ghost towns, there were some towns that were built out and then they didn't get filled up. And that's true. And there are also places like Ordos, for example, that 10 years ago was a total ghost town. You could see the sand rippling across the sidewalks. But today, it's actually full and it's actually [clears throat] bought up and the community is thriving. So you have both towns that didn't de that developed and then not a lot of people moved there and you other other towns that developed and at first no one moved there and then just became total cities like they just exploded with population.
So there were mistakes, there were mistakes made in terms of overdevelopment. However, would you rather as a person, as a middle class working person, live in a place where there are too many homes and they're really affordable? Or would you rather live in a place where there are maybe in the United States there are empty homes, but you can't even afford them because the price of housing is so unattainable that even the young people can't even buy a house. I think the median age for buying the first home is 38 years old. In my father's generation, it was he bought a home when he was 20.
And I think he paid it off within a few years. I mean, the United States, the dream, the American dream is a nightmare. And in in China, we are living the American dream. The dream of owning a home and being able to have afford a family, have one job and live life well and go out a few nights a week. That exists here for the majority of people now. And I think that's something we really need to understand when we talk about how the real estate market is very different in China.
I saw a video recently that said that most people in China or at least in the specific city that he was talking about, uh, they just eat out for food. They they don't like buy groceries. And, uh, I don't know if you remember this because it was so long ago that you're in the US, but if you eat out more than once a week in the US, you kind of feel guilty. You're like, "Am I being financially irresponsible? Am I being cavalier with my resources? I have a tremendous guilt if I go to a restaurant." I'm like, "Man, that's a lot of money." Um, is it true that people in China can just eat out multiple times a day and just feel like it's not, uh, a big, uh, dip into, you know, their their their monthly income or something?
Well, if you go to people who are over 60 in China, they're mostly cooking at home because they grew up in a period of intense frugality and a lot of them experienced extreme poverty and so they are even if they have a lot of money, they don't spend it. But anyone who's our age or younger, uh, they barely cook at home at all. If they cook at home in the American sense, the old American sense from the 1980s and 90s where cooking is a hobby, you know, "Oh, I want to cook something spectacular." But most people I know, the mass vast majority eat every single meal out. Maybe they have breakfast at home. Maybe, maybe not actually. But they just every single meal that you you they have is out.
Now, that doesn't mean a posh five-star, you know, or how many of star restaurant or Michelin restaurant. No, there there there are those kinds of restaurants. There are bougie restaurants in downtown Shanghai and Beijing and so forth. However, most people just go, you know, outside. There's a lot of vendors. There's street food. There's, uh, restaurants everywhere and all of them are full all the time. You know, go to the mall, lunchtime, it's hard to get a seat because all the restaurants are full. People are going out to eat. People get food delivered to their home, get delivered to their work. And pretty much that's mo what most people do is they get delivery. Uh, so yeah, my community is full of people showing up to provide food at multiple times a day. And that's pretty much the truth everywhere. Maybe in the rural countryside, it's not so convenient. So, a lot of people do cook at home, but that's only about 30% of the population.
Wow, that's so interesting. I have, uh, one more. I've been trying to think of all the myths that the Western media feeds us about China. The last one that I I know is somewhat prevalent. You've seen a few of the extremely anti-China scholars that go on Joe Rogan mention it is the stuff about population collapse and population decline.
Uh, is there any weight to any of that?
Well, I mean, you I think context is important. If you look at the demographics in Japan, South Korea, Germany, uh, the UK, France, even in the United States without immigration, and there is population decline, you know, the population is becoming smaller over time. And in China's case, it's not more extreme. It's actually less extreme. This is a sociological phenomenon that happens when countries become wealthy enough to take care of their people well. When there's a social net and when people have good savings and when their needs are taken care of, people tend to have less children because, uh, they know that they can take care of themselves. They don't need to rely on the next generation and so people are having fewer children in China. That's absolutely true and it it mimics the behavior of lots and lots of other developed countries, even though China is not quite a developed country. Uh, China is still on the cusp of becoming a developed country in the next 5 to 10 years, uh, by OECD standards and it's and so forth. Uh, but I don't think it's going to have the negative impact that some people have claimed and that's simply because China firstly has the mo, okay, let's re rephrase this. China has more than half of all factory robots in the entire world. So, you know, a lot of factories are now dark factories, which means they operate 24 hours a day with no lights on. So like it's not like China needs an enormous population to continue its manufacturing sector and even in the service sector, robots are appearing.
So you go to any hotel that's three star or higher in China and there are droids, basically there are these robots that, you know, when you order food from your hotel room, the delivery person shows up and they put it in the robot and leave and then the robot gets on the elevator by itself, comes up the elevator by itself, comes to your room by itself and then your phone rings in your hotel room. You pick up the, oh, you don't, sorry, you answer the door, there's a robot there, your food is there. Uh, also a lot of restaurants like Shaboo Shabu, which is a hot pot restaurant, the half of the waiters and waitresses are robots that, you know, you order your food maybe by yourself, maybe with a waiter or waitress, a server, and then a robot will oftentimes just bring you your food. Um, so there's not a lot, you know, ro China is leading in robotics in ways that people in the West simply cannot understand without living here and also the humanoid revolution is obviously going to happen in China. I mean, if you're in the United States media environment, you might think it's going to be Tesla or something, but it's not. It's definitely already happening because Unitry has already sold quote thousands of units of G1. I I know because I asked them personally and, uh, you can see G1s in major cities. Cafes will buy them to dance in front of their shops to attract attention. And you have the H1s coming out and all these other humanoid robots. Now, they can't clean your house yet, but in 2 or 3 years, they'll be cleaning your house and they'll be helping take care of grandma. So, I think the population issue exists like it does in a lot of other countries, but I don't think it's as serious a problem as people think it is.
Very good. Man, this has been so insightful. Uh, even for me, I research a lot about China. And I try to debunk the myths as much as possible, but it's never going to be as accurate and as descriptive as someone who lives there and gets to experience the the contrast between the narrative and the reality. Jason, this has been such a pleasure talking to you. Um, is there anything you'd like to plug before we head out or is is there anything that you felt like, uh, I should have maybe asked you about in terms of myths about China that that you'd like to speak on?
I'm happy to answer your questions. As an American living in America, you know what Americans are talking about. I think the questions that you formulate are better than anything that I could personally come up with because I don't really know what the tone is like on the ground. So, I really appreciate the fact that you're able to ask the questions that Americans are thinking about. Uh, if you want, you know, if you want, you can follow my uh radio show which airs to a 100red million potential listeners here in China in several countries, uh, the Bridge to China podcast. We're on YouTube. We're on all the podcasting platforms.
Beautiful. And we're gonna have, uh, your social media and all the websites and the links to, uh, your author profile on Amazon so people can buy your books, all of that in the description of, uh, this program. Thank you so much. And I really, really hope the people who saw this, uh, share it around because it's so important. I think we tackled most of the myths that I can think of that the American media spews out and I think you hit each one, uh, out of the ballpark. So, thank you so much for coming on, brother.
Thank you, sir.