The US-China relationship is moving towards a cliff for no rational reason. The two nations of comparable land size are situated on the Earth’s opposite hemisphere, separated by oceans. There are no border issues or historical conflicts between the two nations. The major differences are one, the governance system and two, the people under each's governance system-population. From the governance point of view, the U.S. embraced democracy, capitalism, and liberalism for 250 years, but one must be honest that the U.S. democratic system is still far from perfect. The nation is moving more towards division, with conservatism and socialism balancing capitalism and liberalism. On the other hand, China tried to build a republic nation, abandoning its monarch dynasties and struggling for one hundred years without complete success. China's people revolution was a treacherous experience with foreign invasions and interference. China embraced Marxism and discovered that ideology is empty without pragmatic governance acceptable to its people to realize democracy (People are the masters of the nation). China walked away from the Soviet-style communist system and experimented on its own with decades of mistakes and bitter consequences.
China is different from the U.S. mainly in its population size (today 1.4 billion people) and its 56 ethnic groups. But China has five thousand years of history with experience, wisdom, and innovation in her genes and her 56 ethnic groups are far more homogeneous culturally than other countries with fewer ethnic groups/races. Comparing all aspects, education, industries, science, and technologies (including military development), there are very few differences between the two nations since each has learned from other countries at different times and developed on its path. The U.S. expanded smoothly in the 19th century, learned from the European powers, and emerged as the number one economy in the world. China is a latecomer in industrialization, but she also learned from the West (including the U.S.) and rose rapidly in the last few decades to become the number two economy of the world.
The real significant difference between the U.S. and China is their population. In the U.S., there was fear that the poor one billion Chinese people would eventually compete with the U.S. for world resources. This is a groundless theory, perhaps rooted in the 17th and 18th centuries when American immigrants fought the American Indians for land and resources. Hindsight tells us that with industrialization and sciences and technologies, humans on earth can lift their standard of living more rapidly as exhibited in the last two centuries than in the previous 10 or 20 centuries. The groundless theory worried that if the billion people in China achieved a middle-class standard of living, they would take away all the resources Americans need. The Chinese people proved the groundless theory wrong. China worked hard and was able to lift its billion people out of poverty. Indeed, today many more Chinese tourists are traveling around the world. But the fact that China became the world factory trading as the number one trader with 125 countries supplying them with goods needed. It simply dispelled that groundless theory. Just look at the African continent, its prosperity and development owe a great deal to China's economic policy to make win-win deals with every country in the world. China is the only country that has turned huge deserts into green acres for forest and agriculture use. China is the largest developer and user of green energy. China has made advances in infrastructure, highways, high-speed rails, intelligent ports, and electric energy distributions to support its development. China's Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) designed to share resources and commerce to produce win-win economic results has grown over 125 nations and organizations which proves that collaboration will produce win-win results.
China could not have accomplished the above results without her people working hard. However, the population can be a liability (dragging the country to poverty) or an asset (raising the country's GDP and prosperity). China was extremely poor after WW II (the Japanese invasion of China resulted in 14 years of bitter war, Japan was depleting China's resources to fund its world war), China's GDP was only $30.55B in 1952, but it grew to $1,211B surpassing Italy in 2000, to $2,286.88B surpassing France in 2005, to $2,752.88B surpassing UK in 2006, and to $6,087.88B surpassing Japan in 2010. In 2023, China's GPD is $17,888.97B second only to the U.S. ($27,360B). In per capita GDP, the U.S. is $81,695 (GPD/Population) and China is only $12,681(1/6.44 of the U.S. figure). From this figure, one would understand that the population number (the US has 334,914,895 people and China has 1,408,280,000), especially its productive age group (857,980,000 in the age range of 16-59 in China and 217,594,207 in age of 15-64 in the U.S.) are important numbers to watch, since GPD and per capita GPD are used to gauge a nation's productivity and prosperity. Both China and the U.S. have understood that the total population must be separated into productive age groups, senior group (in China is 60 and above and in the U.S. is 65 and above) and under-age group (in China is 15 and under and in the U.S. is 14 and below) to understand the nation's wellbeing. China's statistics bureau just published some data that we can use to analyze the issue of productivity and competitiveness of a nation and its future outlook.
China's statistics bureau published a report which can be summarized as follows:
1.The total population of China is 1,411,750,000 (Rounding to 10,000) in 2024, is reduced to 1,390,000,000 continuing the trend of reduction (A concern of the Chinese government). The productive group is 857,980,000 (60.77%), the senior group is 310,310,000 (21.98%), and the underage group (including other nonproductive) is 239,990,000 (17%). The Chinese government is concerned over the reduction of the productive group and the increase of the senior group in percentage points. The government is also concerned with the nation's birth rate which affects the underage group.
2.China was concerned with the growing population when its productive group did not generate a high enough GDP. Hence it had a one-child policy for many years. When China improved its GDP with a high percent growth rate, the government wanted to keep the fast GDP growth, so it abandoned the one-child policy and encouraged more births. However, like many developed countries, the birth rate drops as people have a more affluent life. China's birth rate has been dropping since 2018. This year, 2024, a dragon year, China's birth figure is 9,540,000, increased by 520,000 over the 2023 figure, the first time increase in seven years. However, culturally, dragon year always produced more babies, this small increase of 0.576% may disappear in the year of the snake.