Hong Kong - 44 years and counting

sp · Joined: 27 Feb 2003 Posts: 218

What do people think will happen to Hong Kong over the remainder of the '50 years without change' promised by the Communist Party at the handover, and what will happen after the 50 years is up?

cheekicharlie · Joined: 05 Dec 2003 Posts: 9

Nevermind the 50 years, from what I gathered from the Hong Kong newspapers, they want a new government, to cut down on the high unemployment, save the retail and tourists industries, stop the suicides trend, to grant assistance for all the people who got burnt during the housing market crash, and an overhaul to the existing education system and they want it now. It's not even 10 years since the handover and the existing government is doing such an atrocious job. God only knows what will happen in 50 years.......

eye_candy1870 · Joined: 08 May 2003 Posts: 86

You blame the goverment for HK's economic demise. It not because HK doesnt have a 'white' ruler now but the fact mainland China has taken all the manufacturing and service industry away from this tiny place. HK's slide will gather more pace as China grows stronger and stronger as the years go by.

HK has had its day as a trading post, the time has come for China's big cities to emerge and for other nations to overtake such as Malaysia, Singapore and Taiwan.

sp · Joined: 27 Feb 2003 Posts: 218

"The Hong Kong economy has rebounded at a record pace since the Sars outbreak. Aided by a surge in returning tourists, gross domestic product (GDP) rose by 6.4% in the third quarter of 2003.

This is the biggest rise Hong Kong has seen since the Special Administrative Region first began official economic growth records in 1990."

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/3245784.stm

With luck, things won't get messed up again by another SARS outbreak from China. Here's hoping.

eye_candy1870 · Joined: 08 May 2003 Posts: 86

"It is accused of sucking jobs and growth from somewhere else - usually the US or Hong Kong - and a vociferous US Congressional lobby wants it punished."

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/3174022.stm

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/3412069.stm

GundamRX78 · Joined: 25 Jan 2004 Posts: 10 Location: London

All the factories around the world are now moving to China. This will happen in the World. Even UK would suffer
_________________
I love Hong Kong

GweiLo · Joined: 22 Feb 2004 Posts: 149

The US has always had an isolationist/protectionist tendency so I wouldn't take too much note of what US lobbyists have to say, there is nothing new about it.

Is China a "threat" to Britain? I don't see how. The jobs moving to China are the same, and likely to continue to be the same, jobs that have been moving out of the developed economies for decades. Nothing new their either, even the scale of movement (out of the UK) is far less than it was in the 1980's.

China participating in the global economy will undoubtebly be good for everyone. In the short term China's emergence as a significant manufacturer, rather than merely an assembler as in the past, is likely to be painful for economies to whom manufacturing is a significant export industry.....Korea, Malaysia, etc. but even that is likely to be short term pain. Much like that Britain went through in the 1980's when so much of our heavy industry moved overseas.

In the longer term an economically vibrant China presents a host of opportunities for other nations to trade.

Bear in mind that China, like Korea, Malaysia, etc, in the past is attacting manufacturing because it had a lower cost base. It has low wages, poor protection for the environment, poor workplace health and safety standards etc. In time the Chinese will become more demanding on all of these things and the cost base will change. When that happens manufacturing will move elsewhere.

What is happening with China has happened in numerous nations in the past. The hard part isn't attracting jobs....all China had to do for that was to provide some certainty to foreign investors...it is sustaining growth when you can no longer rely on low wages etc as a means of attracting jobs.

At present China isn't actually competing with the developed economies at all, it is merely letting them invest in China. China is competing with less developed manufacturing nations. For example China may make lots of computers...the US, UK, Germany etc don't. We have them made in Malaysia etc. On the other hand China does not have the ability to compete with Silicon Valley in the development and marketing of software....yet. Only when it can compete in the knowledge economy will it actually be competing with the economies of developed nations and even then that isn't a bad thing for the West. Competition is what makes businesses get better at what they do.

Guest · Posted: Sat Mar 13, 2004 3:48 pm Post subject:

The Hong Kong economy has bounced back, in relation to what is happening in New York and Tokyo. The year 2047 reminds me of Wong Kar Wai's new film.

Anyway lets put a few things into perspective and question how Hong Kong came about? The Opium War - http://www.druglibrary.org/schaffer/history/om/om15.htm

eye_candy1870 · Joined: 08 May 2003 Posts: 86

this guy only talks about chinas manufacturing industry. his comments are laughable.

eye_candy1870 · Joined: 08 May 2003 Posts: 86

I just noticed this gwai lo said we dont have software houses? LOL

Guest · Posted: Tue Mar 16, 2004 7:56 pm Post subject:

eye_candy1870, if you want to take part in any discussion, please behave like an adult!

GweiLo · Joined: 22 Feb 2004 Posts: 149

eye candy.
I talked about assembling, manufacturing and the knowledge economy.
I never said anything about China not having software houses.

Anyway, it appears that we have digressed a long way from the original question.

eye_candy1870 · Joined: 08 May 2003 Posts: 86

gwai lo,

so why do you make comments to say china does not compete with western countries?

I work for a very well known IT outsourcing company that outsources alot of its software developement to asian countries. Does this still mean they dont compete with western countries?

I can tell you that there are many british software developers that have been made redundant due to this not to mention the support side.

The only british employees that retain some ownership of their role are that of consultants that over see projects from inception to end.

To be honest alot of white people who do not know any better think of China has a country that only exports. This is a misconception and I cant really be arsed to educate you even though you may be 30+ years old than me.

GweiLo · Joined: 22 Feb 2004 Posts: 149

I make comments because all of the available economic data support them.

Do you really want me to do what I have done in other threads and post the links to the data here just to make you look dafter than you already do? I am happy to do so if you want, but you do seem to have a self destructive streak.

What on earth being white has to do with understanding macro economics I don't know, so perhaps you could explain the relevance of my skin colour to this discussion.

I am always happy to be educated and enlightened. I hope you are too. Your final comments suggest complete ignorance of macro economics. I was discussing whether China is a threat to "western" jobs. Even a simpleton will realise that there are only three ways in which China can pose such a threat. China must displace "western" workers selling goods and services to their home market, or displace western workers selling goods and services overseas not including China, or they must displace wester workers selling goods and services to China.

As there are precious few jobs in the west that are dependent upon selling to China it follows that to be a threat to western jobs China must export.....that is why I only talk about exports. The internal Chinese market is irrelevant to this discussion. You also appear to think that "exports" means manufactured goods.....as any "o" level economics textbook will tell you "exports" include invisibles.....services sold to overses nations.

As it happens I outsource some of my own work to India. The reason I do so is because I did so when I was employed by others and gained experience of the benefits doing of doing so. Since running my own business I thought I'd exploit those benefits too. Outsourcing has not caused, and is unlikely to cause, professional businesses to shed jobs. What it does is enable professional people to focus on what they do well and cost effectively, making thier firms more competitive and winning them more work from clients.

In a nutshell if someone asks me to design a house for them I can do so faster and cheaper than I could otherwise by having the basic drawings done in India. My profits are greater, my clients get better value and the reduced cost enables people who could not have afforded my skills previously to engage me, so I get more work too.....no job losses.....indeed an increased number of jobs because I get more work as a result of lower costs.

Guest · Posted: Sun Mar 21, 2004 9:28 pm Post subject:

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