China Makes Major Push in Its Ambitious Digital Yuan Project (cnn.com) 40
Public sector workers in an eastern Chinese city are set to be paid fully in digital yuan, as the country makes a significant push to popularize the currency. From a report: Changshu, located in the province of Jiangsu, will start the new payment process in May, according to an official document widely posted on government websites. This is the biggest rollout of the currency, also known as the e-CNY, in China so far, according to state media. Government employees as well as staff at state-owned companies and public institutions such as schools, hospitals, libraries, research institutes and media organizations in the city will be affected. Changshu, a city of 1.7 million residents, was already experimenting with the digital yuan, a form of money that exists only online and is managed and backed by China's central bank. Like cryptocurrency, the digital yuan incorporates some elements of blockchain technology: Every transaction is recorded and traceable in a digital ledger. Since last October, Changshu has been paying the transit subsidies for some government employees in digital yuan. China is already on the verge of becoming a cashless society, but the vast majority of electronic transactions happen on privately owned apps (Alipay and WeChat Pay), outside of the immediate purview of the state.
In short 1984 2.0 (Score:5, Insightful)
Their Big Brother payment system is getting bigger and brotherier.
Re:In short 1984 2.0 (Score:5, Insightful)
Yep, and remember...when you social credit score goes down, your bank balance disappears too.
Geez, 1984 was supposed to be a fictional story, not a blueprint for society.
Re:In short 1984 2.0 (Score:5, Informative)
> 1984 was supposed to be a fictional story, not a blueprint for society.
Actually, it's based on the early Soviet Union. It was projecting the Soviets into the future.
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https://www.quora.com/What-do-... [quora.com]
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Not just communist dictatorships, but fascist ones too. He fought in Spain and was inspired by the paranoia felt by political dissidents.
That's where the idea for "IngSoc", the ruling party in what used to be the UK, came from. It's a contraction of English Socialism, modelled on the Nazis contraction of National Socialism. I.e. fascism that used populist socialist ideas to gain a footing with the electorate.
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Animal Farm is about the USSR. 1984 has more influences. The government of Oceania is based on an amalgamation of Nazi Germany and Stalinist Russia, but the idea of the superstates comes from the way Roosevelt, Churchill and Stalin divided the world up into "Zones of Influence" at the 1943 Tehran conference.
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Sort of agree, but are big cash transactions good for? (Drug deals?) I have bought motorcycles for (literal) cash, but you have to register them anyways so...
Things your government does not approve of. Yes, that does include crime, but is not by any means limited to it. Unless you're one of those "if you're doing nothing wrong you have nothing to hide" idiots.
Popularity (Score:4, Insightful)
It's not exactly popularity they're measuring by forcing the payment method on everyone, it's compliance.
This is not a good thing for human freedom.
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I wouldn't call China "socialist". Their economy is a mix of capitalism and socialism. At the local and mom-and-pop store level, it's very capitalistic.
Re:Popularity (Score:4, Insightful)
I think "authoritarian capitalist" fits them better. There's nothing "mom & pop" about their capitalism. They have massive conglomerates just like other industrialized countries. I think China still calls themselves "socialist / communist" mostly for historic / ideological reasons, not because they really fit that definition anymore. The fact that they have to kowtow to government wishes is more a function of the authoritarian nature of the government, not any socialist policies, although that's admittedly a somewhat vague line.
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> There's nothing "mom & pop" about their capitalism.
What I meant is that smaller businesses are less likely to be the target of gov't monitoring, interference, and intervention. The larger the company, the more their gov't likes to stick its fingers into their biz.
Thus, their system is quite laissez-faire for smaller co's, but less so for bigger ones. Sure, they have corruption and dumb regulations at the lower level, but that's because humans are involved.
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What I meant is that smaller businesses are less likely to be the target of gov't monitoring, interference, and intervention. The larger the company, the more their gov't likes to stick its fingers into their biz.
Thus, their system is quite laissez-faire for smaller co's, but less so for bigger ones. Sure, they have corruption and dumb regulations at the lower level, but that's because humans are involved.
Maybe, maybe not. I could see some small-time wanna-be party bigshot sticking his finger in local business' pies too There are a gazillion examples of the big fish / small pond stories in the US, like some insane housewife becoming a local tyrant as head of the homeowner's associate, etc. I'm not sure why China, or really, any other country, would be exempt from this phenomenon. Although granted, it probably is a bit easier for a small shop to stay under the radar if they try.
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I think China still calls themselves "socialist / communist" mostly for historic / ideological reasons, not because they really fit that definition anymore.
They have the ideology that once they become rich, then they will become equitable. Xi won his leadership role in part by promising that China can work on becoming rich and equitable at the same time, thus settling the debate between people who wanted to become rich first, and others who wanted to become equitable first.
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The word you are looking for is Fascist, in Mussolini's sense of the word.
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It's about tax. Most people in China didn't pay tax. There was no way to enforce sales tax when everything was paid for in cash. Wages paid in cash were difficult to levy income tax on.
Private tech companies started offering mobile payments via QR codes, which proved popular because all you needed was a cheap used phone and a free account. The government saw the benefit of being able to tax transactions, and of course monitor them too.
It's mostly no different to how Western countries work, where transaction
I doubt they thought this true (Score:4, Interesting)
For most poor people running on the bank is a big hassle, they don't have two bank accounts. Now they are going to get two bank accounts, one of them covered by the full faith and credit of China's government.
Combine that with the fact China's deposit guarantee doesn't work as smoothly as the American one and it's going to have some unintended consequences. Sure they can detect transfer flows and quickly cut off the transfers, but then people panic.
God forbid the media not dickride China. (Score:3, Interesting)
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I challenge anyone to find major Western media headlines deriding anything China has done in the last decade as stupid, weak, or cowardly.
Same source. Last week.
Chinese ambassador sparks European outrage over suggestion former Soviet states don’t exist. [cnn.com]
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That was one guy that Beijing immediately distanced itself from, not a state policy initiative of China.
I have little doubt that is the official position of Winnie, at least in so far as he has told his little war criminal buddy. Pooh bear has the same grievance about Taiwan and Hong Kong as Eeyore does with the former Soviet republics. I prefer not to think what they do to console themselves in private.
And I sure would not want to be "that one guy" who accidentally mentioned it out loud.
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I challenge anyone to find major Western media headlines deriding anything China has done in the last decade as stupid, weak, or cowardly. Basically there's an alliance between opposing propaganda on both sides to build up China's status.
This is because the USA needs to build China up as an adversary in order to support its military industrial complex, which many millions of American jobs depend on.
Therefore, you may as well just give in and agree that you've always been at war with China.
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The reality that it's a hostile, despotic, and still largely impoverished country with a negative worldwide influence...and not much of a threat past that...is lost in the false polarization of media into sycophancy and paranoia.
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While at the same time basically agreeing with China's own propaganda.
The reality that it's a hostile, despotic, and still largely impoverished country with a negative worldwide influence...and not much of a threat past that...is lost in the false polarization of media into sycophancy and paranoia.
While, in the USA people carry guns because they feel like they need them for self defense. I can't imagine living in such a horrible third world shit hole where I feel so threatened in my daily life that I have to carry a gun.
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Stop trying to weave a conspiracy out of thin air.
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If you're capable of rational argument, try any time. How is anything I said not in line with the facts?
And if they something the CCP doesn't like.... (Score:2)
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First questions (Score:2)
1. What's the exchange rate with real money?
2. How do I do it?
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Gee, really... what a surprise...
But thanks for confirming my expectations.
That's great! (Score:5, Insightful)
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Digital money (Score:4)
Money is something government-issued that you can hold in your hand and physically exchange for other things of value: Cyberpunk got it right with their 'cred-stick', an electronic wallet. Thus, physical notes (or data bits) can be moved from wallet to wallet: Which is problematic because of counterfeiting. The usual government response is a centralized storage service, AKA a bank. If this requires another bank account, it's not digital money.
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