[fallingknife]

I don't really buy this since China has industrialized rapidly without much population growth at all. They have built infrastructure like high speed rail that we are unable to build in the US, so I also don't buy the "fully deployed modern infrastructure" line.

[danparsonson]

Yeah but their starting point was different again - they already had the population, and were able to piggy back on technological progress from other countries by borrowing or stealing it. The other thing they have is an authoritarian government; a country can achieve a lot in a short time when it can freely sideline the concerns and needs of its citizens.

[cayley_graph]

I'm not a China defender, but sidelining the concerns and needs of its citizens isn't why China is able to do things like high speed rail or build high density infrastructure in general. Lots there view having their property taken by the government and relocated as a good thing, because it almost always happens way above market rates. There are exceptions, of course, but my impression is that it is not the norm. Feel free to correct me. This isn't a defense of China in general, but it is totally possible to have good public transit in the United States.

And mind you that China isn't unique in bootstrapping its industrial revolution by mass theft of IP. If I were you, I'd look into the stunts us Americans pulled during our industrialization. The sad fact of the matter is that the government of this country no longer works for its own people, and that's why so many things are far below par. For many things, we _could_, but simply _don't_.

[api]

China went from a few tens of millions of modern people to over a billion modern people. Look at it that way. They weren’t new people but they were economically speaking.

The US is all modern people with little population growth. We have no giant wave of latent demand.