Student Question (L茵Z):
A question for you! Was our traditional so-called “provider and reproducer” functional structure formed precisely to suppress education costs — including educational risks — within the family, the smallest unit of social division and cooperation? And is it feasible to transfer those costs elsewhere?
Looking at successful pro-natalist policies overseas — from reward systems and reduced education spending, to legislation protecting workplace rights for mothers, to policies encouraging fathers to take paternity leave — at their core, all of these transfer a portion of the cost onto society. One of the reasons these policies actually work, in my view, comes down to a difference in mindset: the question of who “owns” children.
All current information points toward one thing: a pervasive pessimism about slumping demand. The clearest example is Germany’s PMI — the manufacturing powerhouse of Europe — approaching 30. This so-called Purchasing Managers’ Index reflects the judgments made by supply chain participants, based on industry experience and their own conditions, about future production expectations — judgments that drive decisions to increase or reduce inventory. The figure signals whether production willingness is expanding or contracting. Over the past few months, it broke above 50 several times, prompting sweeping pessimistic coverage from Western media. But Germany’s index has since fallen below 40. Subsequently released US data shows that over the first seven months, American imports from the rest of the world dropped by $1 trillion compared to the same period last year. As the world’s largest consumer market, the Eagle’s (America’s) imports are other countries’ exports; its demand is other nations’ production. This sharp drop in demand has left mid- and downstream manufacturers starved of orders, which in turn has kept raw material exports and commodities in a sustained slump. The commodity price cycle, therefore, will determine the overall direction of the global economy.
Student Question
Current situation: I own a 75 sqm two-bedroom apartment in Shanghai, built in 1998, located outside the outer ring. I want to sell and upgrade for my two kids.
Context and challenges: I’m looking to take advantage of Shanghai’s current “property-recognition, not loan-recognition” policy to upgrade. Two specific concerns: a. I’m hesitant about taking on more leverage because I’m uncertain about my future career income. b. I’m torn between a newer property in a less desirable location versus an older second-hand property in a better one.
Most importantly — when the era is favorable and the environment is right, even ordinary people can ride the wave to prosperity.
For ordinary people, no investment is more significant than buying property. Most people won’t put hundreds of thousands into stocks, but they will put hundreds of thousands into real estate. Property is the investment tool most capable of widening the wealth gap among ordinary people — because in investment terms, this is a heavy-position, leveraged play.
Picking up from my last piece — let me talk about why my mindset has stayed solid despite everything.
This is a bigger topic, so let me be clear upfront.
First: I remain personally optimistic about the future. Not a naive, head-in-the-sand kind of optimism — but a considered judgment reached after careful analysis and observation.
Second: I’m deeply bullish on what I call the “industrial crown” sectors — new energy, precision manufacturing, electric vehicles, aerospace, energy storage, semiconductors. These are industries that generate real, powerful economic momentum. The progress they’ve made over the past five years has been nothing short of remarkable — a dominant, leave-everyone-in-the-dust kind of lead.
This morning, a friend posed a thoughtful question: “Master Chi, do you think the days ahead will actually improve?”
He was asking against the backdrop of a world in quiet turbulence — shifting global conditions, the Wagner leader’s death, Japan’s mass discharge of radioactive water. Something in him felt unsettled. Like life had become impossible to carry forward.
My first instinct was to brush it off: Don’t stress yourself out. Don’t overthink it. But that felt wrong. So instead, I wrote something longer. Might as well share it here.
In the distance lies the only passage from the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau into the Hexi Corridor: the Dangkin Mountain Gap — with the Qilian Mountain ranges to the east and the Altun Mountains, connecting to the Kunlun range, to the west. From the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, a steep winding road descends continuously for 48 kilometers through this gap before entering the Hexi Corridor, dropping more than 2,000 meters in elevation. After coming down the mountain, the pressure in your eardrums builds so intensely that you can barely hear a thing.
This evening I’d like to share a particularly representative reader question — one that I believe speaks to the hearts of many during these difficult times.
Student Question:
Dear Master Chi, as a reader who follows your articles every day, I’m taking the liberty of writing to you with a question.
This is something I’ve thought over carefully — I spent a long time typing it out, working up the courage to finally send it. And I believe it also speaks for many of our brothers and sisters who’ve been feeling the same way lately.
Since 1998, in order to address the insufficient pull of an export-oriented economy and the lack of local development funding following reforms to the fiscal system, real estate — under official guidance, planning, and promotion — gradually became the core industry driving urban development.
The industry’s vigorous growth resolved a series of social problems: including but not limited to local development financing, residential asset appreciation, housing needs during urbanization, the migration and employment of surplus rural labor, and the stimulating effect on related upstream and downstream industries. When a single sector can benefit all major stakeholders across society, it earns unanimous enthusiasm from society’s key participants. Behind this enthusiasm lies not only a concentration of resources, but also policy favoritism and lagging regulation. This creates a spiraling, self-reinforcing surge — and in the process, forges new social power structures and new coalitions of shared interests. These become internal forces resisting change. As a result, any reform that touches deep-seated interests is difficult and delayed — and that delay often gradually ferments into a bitter outcome for society as a whole.
Student Question
Master, I’ve been a full-time stay-at-home mother for six years. Our household income suddenly dried up. My husband was abruptly laid off by his company in July. We’re living off savings now. He’s still job hunting but hasn’t gotten a single interview — this year feels impossible for finding work. We have two children, and my husband is under enormous pressure. I haven’t worked in a long time, so finding employment isn’t easy for me either. When it comes to making money through a side income — could you offer some guidance?