reports the Wall Street Journal: "China’s government is rolling out a charm offensive to lure back foreigners… One U.S. business executive said he was unsettled in mid-2023 when a group of nine police officers showed up at his door in Beijing one evening, demanding to examine his passport and confirm his employer, as one of the officers recorded the interaction with a smartphone. The officers didn’t give a reason for the visit, he said." Not completely ineducable.
You see, our betters leading our various institutions (primarily financial, in this case) have discovered exit bans along with capital controls and the other joys of doing business in mainland China.
Never fear: there are still credentialed fools willing to carry water for the CPP: "Economists say that foreign executives bring advanced knowledge and skills that China still needs… In the longer term, longtime expatriates say, the lack of foreign interest could deplete the population of bridge builders between China and the world and deepen mistrust and misunderstandings." Perhaps their long stay in China has left them unable to read the room in the US: that argument has largely lost its appeal. As Jim Geraghty notes "Increased U.S. Trade with China Was Supposed to Change Beijing’s Behavior. It Didn’t."
I'll close with my periodic reminders:
"What if we could just be China for a day? I mean, just, just, just one day. You know, I mean, where we could actually, you know, authorize the right solutions, and I do think there is a sense of that, on, on everything from the economy to environment" – Thomas L. Friedman Wants Us "to be China for a day," to "authorize the right solutions"
"There's a level of admiration I actually have for China. Their basic dictatorship is actually allowing them to turn their economy around on a dime."– Justin Trudeau's 'foolish' China remarks spark anger | CBC News
"I think it’s a role model for many countries," Schwab said… the Chinese model is certainly a very attractive model for quite a number of countries"– World Economic Forum founder & Chair Klaus Schwab,"– World Economic Forum chair Klaus Schwab declares on Chinese state TV: 'China is a model for many nations'
Update: An interesting follow-up from the Journal today: It Only Takes a $7,000 Debt to End Up Trapped in China