Blogs » Society » China’s Cooking The Books Again, All Is Well With The Economy (In The Last Act)

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• China’s Cooking The Books Again, All Is Well With The Economy (In The Last Act)
• Is China's Duanwu Festival the world's first gay Valentine's Day?
• Saturday Night Musical Outro: Gang Gang Dance – Chinese High
• Enjoy: Epic Rap Battle Between Kim Jong-il And Hulk Hogan, With Randy Savage

China’s Cooking The Books Again, All Is Well With The Economy (In The Last Act) Posted: 23 Jun 2012 05:49 PM PDT Keith Bradsher Keith Bradsher, in 'Chinese Data Mask Depth of Slowdown, Executives Say,' another of his excellent articles, pulls out Li Keqiang's well-known comments: An American diplomatic cable released by WikiLeaks shows that Li Keqiang, widely expected to become premier of China this autumn, said in 2007 that he regarded China's broad measures of economic growth as " 'man-made' and therefore unreliable." Mr. Li told an American diplomat that he looked instead to three indicators that he described as less likely to be fudged: electricity consumption, volume of rail cargo and the disbursement of bank loans. And, whether taking Mr. Li's advice or just using good common sense, analysts of the Chinese economy have relied these and similar measures to try to get a sense of how China is really doing. Now, Mr. Bradsher calls into question one of those crucial measures, electricity consumption: As the Chinese economy continues to sputter, prominent corporate executives in China and Western economistssay there is evidence that local and provincial officials are falsifying economic statistics to disguise the true depth of the troubles. Record-setting mountains of excess coal have accumulated at the country's biggest storage areas because power plants are burning less coal in the face of tumbling electricity demand. But local and provincial government officials have forced plant managers not to report to Beijing the full extent of the slowdown, power sector executives said. If this is happening, why is it happening now? Promotions in a year of political transition: Questions about the quality and accuracy of Chinese economic data are longstanding, but the concerns now being raised are unusual. This year is the first time since 1989 that a sharp economic slowdown has coincided with the once-a-decade changeover in the country's top leadership. Officials at all levels of government are under pressure to report good economic results to Beijing as they wait for promotions, demotions and transfers to cascade down from Beijing. So narrower and seemingly more obscure measures of economic activity are being falsified, according to the executives and economists. All that said, there are doubters about how badly the books are being cooked if at all: Jonathan Sinton, a China energy specialist at the International Energy Agency, said he had not heard of false data in China's electricity sector, and he doubted it would be feasible at the five biggest electricity generation companies that together produce half of China's electricity. "If there is a problem, it is going to be located in the smaller producers," he said, cautioning that even these producers would eventually have to submit accurate information to reconcile fuel, electricity and financial accounts. And, finally, there are those of us who aren't particularly worried one way or the other about the Chinese economy: Stephen Green, a China economist at Standard Chartered Bank, said that the Chinese economy was still likely to recover this autumn as extra bank lending started to stimulate spending. I would add to that also that it will recover when the actions that the Central Government dares not call 'stimulus' kicks in. The new stimulus may be better run, better targeted, better fitting the reform agenda, but it will be as big as it needs to be to get the job done. Hu Jintao is not planning to have the legacy: 'He's the guy who drove the Chinese economy into a ditch.'

Is China's Duanwu Festival the world's first gay Valentine's Day? Posted: 23 Jun 2012 07:13 AM PDT A growing chorus of voices is challenging the official narrative of the great Warring States poet Qu Yuan (屈原) as a patriot who, in an apparent suicide in 278 BC, threw himself into the Miluo River holding a heavy rock to protest against the alliance of the state of Chu with the hegemonic Qin state. [ more › ]

Saturday Night Musical Outro: Gang Gang Dance – Chinese High Posted: 23 Jun 2012 06:00 AM PDT As always, we're nothing without you. Stay safe on this Saturday night.

Enjoy: Epic Rap Battle Between Kim Jong-il And Hulk Hogan, With Randy Savage Posted: 22 Jun 2012 10:00 PM PDT Last week, we posted a video from Nice Peter called Chillin Panda Baby. What we failed to mention was that Nice Peter is sort of famous on the Internet for a series of amazing vids called "Epic Rap Battle," each with millions and millions of views (like, 58 million, in the case of Darth Vadar vs. Hitler). I've embedded what I think is the only Asia-centric battle, featuring the line, "Beijing is in China, you blond asshole." The late Macho Man Randy Savage is a character. Enjoy. Youku video for those in China after the jump.

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