China

For centuries China stood as a leading civilization, outpacing the rest of the world in the arts and sciences, but in the 19th and early 20th centuries, the country was beset by civil unrest, major famines, military defeats, and foreign occupation. After World War II, the Communists under MAO Zedong established an autocratic socialist system that, while ensuring China's sovereignty, imposed strict controls over everyday life and cost the lives of tens of millions of people. After 1978, MAO's successor DENG Xiaoping and other leaders focused on market-oriented economic development and by 2000 output had quadrupled. For much of the population, living standards have improved dramatically and the room for personal choice has expanded, yet political controls remain tight. China since the early 1990s has increased its global outreach and participation in international organizations.

Economical characteristics

 * Currency: Chinese yuan (renminbi) (¥) (ISO code: CNY)
 * Central bank discount rate: 2.79% (31 December 2008)
 * Commercial banks lending rate: 5.31% (31 December 2008)
 * Stock of money (M1): $2.434 trillion (31 December 2008)
 * Quasi money (with M1 makes M2): $4.523 trillion (31 December 2008)

Notable events:

 * Banking crisis: 1883, 1923-1925, 1931, 1934-1937, 1997-1999
 * Hyperinflation: 1946-1948
 * Years in inflation: 10% (share of years 1850-2009 with annual inflation above 20 per cent per annum)
 * Public default: 1921-1936, 1939-1949 (external), 1921, 1932 (domestic)

Housing bubble
China's economy is continuing to grow despite the global recession, helped by massive government spending. For years, regional governments across China have been building massive real estate projects that have attracted both private and corporate buyers. As prices have continued to rise (residential values in 70 large and medium-size cities across China soared in 2009, according to real estate consultancy Colliers International), more investors have become speculators, buying brand-new properties with the sole intention of flipping them.

A notable example is the city Ordos in Inner Mongolia, a whole town built with government money that is standing empty. The district was originally designed to house, support and entertain 1 million people.

Links

 * China on Wikipedia
 * Central bank of China
 * Country profile (pdf) from the Enterprise Studies page (part of the The World Bank Group)
 * Studies from the Library of Congress (1986-1998)
 * BBC country profile
 * China's Benign Neglect Pays Off by K.Y. Leong, November 2005
 * Economic Decline and the Failure of Chinese Enterpreneurs (pdf) by Greg Clydesdale, 2007
 * Chinese equities: even riskier than you think by Sean Corrigan, September 2007
 * Is China headed toward collapse? by Eamon Javers, October 2009
 * How China Won and Russia Lost by Paul R. Gregory and Kate Zhou, December 2009
 * Libertarianism in Ancient China by Murray N. Rothbard, from Economic Thought Before Adam Smith
 * Pollution and Government Failure in China by Eric M. Staib, June 2010
 * Chinese Factories Now Compete to Woo Laborers by Andrew Jacobs, July 2010
 * Economic Thought in Ancient Greece by Jesus Huerta de Soto, September 2010, on Taoism
 * Mao's Great Leap Forward 'killed 45 million in four years' by Arifa Akbar, September 2010
 * The Last Chinese Banking Crisis Actually WAS Painful, And The Next Will Be Worse by Michael Pettis, January, 2011
 * China's Debt Burden Limits Policy Leeway by Tom Orlik, March 2011
 * China's coming collapse by Jason Kirby, March 2011
 * The China Bust: Tic Toc by Kel Kelly, October 2011
 * China’s Richest Village opens Skyscraper, by Mark Thornton, November 2011
 * China's Hard Landing from the Wall Street Journal, December 2011
 * This is a face and this is a face project, any questions? by Tim Swanson, June 2012
 * China's Forgotten Industrial Revolution and China's Historic Error by Stephen Davies
 * China's Spontaneous Order by James A. Dorn
 * China Passes U.S. to Become World’s Biggest Trading Nation, Bloomberg News, February 2013
 * This '60 Minutes' Video Of China's Ghost Cities Is More Surreal Than Anything We've Ever Seen (video) by Mamta Badkar, March 2013
 * China’s Looming Bust by David Howden, July 2013
 * The Myth of Chinese Super Schools by Diane Ravitch, November 2014
 * China’s Looming Bust by David Howden, July 2013
 * The Myth of Chinese Super Schools by Diane Ravitch, November 2014