China's Quick-Rich
Gurus
14 Aug 2007
According to a joint study
done by some local media in China, of nearly
8,000 people surveyed, 65.3% held rather
negative views of today's “rich Chinese”,
describing them as being showy, greedy and
rotten.
The middle kingdom used to be
one of the richest - if not THE richest -
countries in the world for thousands of
years. But in the recently century, China
went near bankruptcy to the point where
everyone was equally proudly poor with almost
no exception. It was not until about couple
of decades ago when a rich-class started
emerging, and understandably, majority of the
members in this class are get-rich-quick
folks. Chinese call these people baofahu
(Sudden-rich Household 爆发户).
Baofahu isn't a
complimentary term praising those who rise up
in society through their own effort, but is a
word ascribing to those who are rich in
wealth but poor in culture and manners.
Among today’s baofahus in
China, few get rich quicker than property
developers. Just look how China’s housing
price is rising, rising and rising, you’ll
get a fair idea of how the developers’
fortune growing, growing and growing.
And their guts are blowing,
blowing and blowing.
Not too long ago, a government
building was partially demolished by
developers without the government consent. If
they can treat governments with such
contempt, does anyone need to stretch his
imagination to picture how they are treating
the ordinary people?
A building
belonging to a tourism bureau in
Chongqing was partially illegally
demolished by developers
It is no wonder that they
become, along with many other quick-rich
gurus, the most hated figures in China.
But not everyone despises
them. Some don’t, particularly some experts
don’t, and particularly those with their
special expertise in one thing, and one thing
only - promoting the wholesale of the Western
free-market system - don’t. An economist
declaimed openly that it is only reasonable
that the houses, cars and airplanes are made
just for the rich people. He further offered
himself to be the spokesman of affluent
Chinese.
By the same token, it should
only be reasonable that the houses, cars and
airplanes are made exclusively for the rich
nations. And culture too, and the Games too,
and WMD too.
Then if China is by and large
still poor, it ought to stick to a life with
bungalows, horse-draw carts and wooden boats.
If its people want anything more than that,
be it in economy, culture or sports, that
would certainly deplete the resource of the
developed courntries, endanger the
environment of the whole world, and hurting
the pride of the rich nations.
Wonder from where the wealthy
states can find a better spokesman for them
in China. Strongly recommend!
