Between the USA and China, definitely China. Seems pretty simple. They have much higher standards of living and while it's very bad you can't say Tiananmen Square, that doesn't overrule food and shelter. They have all the job openings for advanced technology work as well - they no longer just manufacture US designs but are rapidly expanding into making better versions of most things, and the main reason we haven't heard about them is that none of the documentation is in English.
They're going to soon find out their stash of dollars is toilet paper, but that won't make too much of a difference with such an advanced economy of their own - the USA will surely have yuan reserves in 30 years.
Safety protects liberty, otherwise you get public safety authoritarians like Duterte or Bukele. This is not advocacy for authoritarianism. It's advocacy for assertive liberalism that is effective at delivering a core human need in order to protect liberalism from itself.
The key words are "essential" and "temporary" - the nouns can be replaced with pretty much anything.
In what way do you think the USA is currently doing better than China? Yes you can talk about Tiananmen Square, obviously, but there are other things you can't talk about.
Freedom of speech, freedom of association and freedom from abitrary detention, just to name a few.
Of course some speech, association and rule of law (as opposed to rule by law) is enjoyed by most people. But it is indisputable that China restricts speech and association severely, and silences "troublemakers" arbitrarily.
Let me preempt the inevitable replies: this comment is about China and China alone. It it factual irrespective of what freedoms may or may not be enjoyed anywhere else including the US.
A freedom does or does not exist. Some cultures have more freedom than others. If it's "Western" of me to admit I prefer more freedoms rather than less, I'll very proudly own up to that. But I don't know what that has got to do with the question I answered.
As for concrete examples:
#1: Freedom of speech -- one may not advocate for LGBTQ+ rights, criticize the ruling party, advocate for a change of government or political system in China, state that Taiwan is an independent nation, argue in favor of free and open elections in Hong Kong, advocate for workers' rights, talk about Tiananmen Square, talk about human rights abuses in Xinjiang, talk about human rights abuses in China at all... and the list goes on. Someone might manage to do so, sneaking past the firewall, but they are liable to be slammed with #3 below.
#2: Freedom of association -- contrary to what one might expect in a country with "Socialism with Chinese characteristics", one may not unionize. In fact one may not set up any civil society group outside the approval of the CPC. I could editorialize on the reasons for this but I'll refrain in the interest of brevity.
#3: Freedom from arbitrary detention -- China has a specific category of criminal offense just for this: being able to detain anyone at any time for any reason. The crime is "Picking quarrels and provoking trouble", and is used liberally on anyone who speaks out against the government and manages to catch their attention. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Picking_quarrels_and_provoking...
Now, Chinese people, and others, will argue that there's this reasona and that reason why it's good to restrict freedoms in this way. I obviously disagree. But what shouldn't be in dispute is the fact that these freedoms are very much restricted in China.
I wasn't saying China has those freedoms, just that China has at least as much of them as the US. Just today - or was it yesterday - an ICE agent peered into a woman's driver side window and shot her three times point blank. Because of her speech. Where's the freedom there?
I agree that they do control information, but we also face the paradox that laws in the West do very little to regulate social media, and even the current US administration threatens to impose tariffs to EU [0].
Even Google and other big techs did a gigantic lobby against it in Brazil[1].
The appointed lawyer by Twitter, in 2023, even said in a meeting with the Brazil Minister of Justice: “That the Brazilian laws did not follow their Terms of Use”[2]. In the previous week there was a massacre at childcare which killed 4 children[3].
What the government asked at that time was to delete/suspend related accounts that promoted this type of crime.
the chinese are definitely going to pull ahead, but we're definitely not going to see US fall like that.
it's too easy to assassinate world leaders for a state sponsored government so you have to beg the question: why has nobody done it? the relative peace we have is built on top of mutual destruction and realistically US won't fall without taking most of the world with it.
the reason I believe it's easy because US SS seemingly lost their edge as there haven't been many real threats against the president to begin with. I just can't imagine that there is much any government could do against a 400-500km/h drone specialized for a 20 second mission from being to accomplish the goal, the world leader would be dead by the time anyone even registered that there is a threat.
> but we're definitely not going to see US fall like that.
We're already seeing that. You probably live in a coastal city, and so might be unaware of how just undeveloped so much of the country is. Look at things like literacy levels and political unrest as well.
The US is absolutely falling, it can be saved but not with the way half the country seems to vote.
wow, you're way off the mark - I am sitting in a soviet building enjoying life for less than the minimum wage at times just because I can and I am very well aware of large parts of the US since I am friends with at least one person from every state.
but to get to the actual point: US is big, like very big and dominated by the strongest propaganda machine in the world: https://youtu.be/BY9uuxC_YAQ
I don't really understand the relevance of what you've said except that you think I'm off the mark.
You really don't think the US has had a steep decline over the last 2 decades in quality of life for most people? I'm not talking about people with six figure tech jobs in big cities.
ah I guess I should have been clearer: I am friends with a lot of people - sure it's pretty bad in some states, but america is huge and nothing really changed for them within the decade.
I can't really speak for decades, none of us have been alive that long to live that difference - people generally live wealthier lives than 2 decades ago, at the cost of losing the ability to repair your own shit, being locked into buying new things when old ones work fine. but that's the failure of capitalism and legislation to subdue these issues.
What I am really trying to say is that I believe in time everything will be okay as long as we manage to survive the hardest challenge we have right now: AI causing major distruption in every single business causing further imbalance between people and coorperations.
> america is huge and nothing really changed for them within the decade.
People don't necessarily notice gradual changes. We have objective measures to show things have changed.
> I can't really speak for decades, none of us have been alive that long to live that difference
There's plenty of 50 and 60, even 70 year olds on this site...
> people generally live wealthier lives than 2 decades ago
Some people do. One of the biggest changes has been the continued erosion of the middle class.
> What I am really trying to say is that I believe in time everything will be okay as long as we manage to survive the hardest challenge we have right now: AI causing major distruption in every single business causing further imbalance between people and coorperations.
AI is nothing but a distraction. The problem is the ignorance of half the voting population who continually votes against their own interests out fear fueled by misinformation.
Are they? Please don't forget at least 50M Chinese in abject poverty and a demographic crisis barreling towards them that is not avoidable unless they develop cloning vats that can rapidly age a clone to productive adulthood in a compressed timeframe.
nothing a genocide or two can't solve (based on a real story)
the governments have grown too powerful to be overthrown by people, and yes I do realize that the military itself is made out of people (for now), but in a way they are brainwashed? to follow orders from above.
On average, the USA is significantly richer than China and most EU countries, and this shows up in macro indicators such as GDP per capita, median income, and average wealth per adult. Even people at the lower end of the income distribution in the US often have higher nominal incomes than poor people in China, and sometimes higher than in poorer EU countries. Compared to China in particular, a poor person in the US usually has access to far more money and material goods.
However, Europe is not a single comparison point. In many Western European countries (France, Germany, Scandinavia), poor people often have similar or even better effective living standards than poor Americans once public services are included. Free or heavily subsidized healthcare, education, housing support, and transport can compensate for lower cash income and raise real living conditions.
Finally, inequality matters. The US has much higher income inequality and weaker social safety nets than most of Europe. This means that while the country is richer overall, being poor in the US can be harsher than being poor in many EU countries, especially when accounting for healthcare costs and financial risk.
So the claim is broadly true when comparing the US to China, but not universally true when comparing the US to Europe, and it oversimplifies what “having more money” actually means.
ps: I live in Switzerland and it is a whole different story.
They're going to soon find out their stash of dollars is toilet paper, but that won't make too much of a difference with such an advanced economy of their own - the USA will surely have yuan reserves in 30 years.