1. scandihoovian says:

    I wonder what’s stopping people from looting these empty buildings if there’s nobody around to keep watch even.

  2. Ah_Yea says:

    This is a gleaming, shiny fluff piece.

    Compare the above to this MUCH better and far deeper analysis.
    http://eyeblast.tv/public/video.aspx?v=hdaGqG6USU

  3. podman says:

    @1
    To answer your question: In China the threat of death by firing squad is a very persuasive way of preventing crime. No slap on the wrist justice there.

  4. chuck says:

    #1 – the other reason they are not looting the empty buildings: they are empty. and in the middle of nowhere.

  5. bobbo, words have a meaning and a context says:

    “if it takes a decade to make money, that’s ok” /// That and China growing by the size of 10 Chicago’s every year allows me to think the video is making its omelet a bit too soon?

    It’s CHINA–the progressive heaven as dud will say. Not the same as quarterly driven profit statements as in the GOUSA. Each system has its pro’s and con’s. Sadly, in USA, Con’s don’t get prosecuted==far outweighing the downside of centrally planned fascist states.

  6. moe says:

    They’ll be filled in time. The Chinese government offers lots of tasty breaks to heavy hitters whether they’re indigenous, regional or combined with offshore heavy hitters.

    Not so different from Dixie governors enticing Japanese and Euro car companies. Only it’s BYD and Warren Buffett, Foxconn and HonHai/Terry Gou building plants in the desert West.

  7. Grandpa says:

    Maybe it’s empty because of the filthy air.

  8. What? says:

    The truth is that everyone is a greedy moron.

    Greed is a given, we are all greedy because to the victors go the spoils. And, as we are all victors, and we all hope for greater spoils tomorrow, we each support the status quo. This is an animal trait, not limited to America, whites, etc. We are all this way. Where we are all different is which spoils we wish for: be it sex, money, manipulating our fellow creatures, whatever.

    Where we are morons is that we behave as though we’ll never have to pay the piper.

  9. RLF says:

    Looks like Detroit, but in better shape.

  10. msbpodcast says:

    They’re doing exactly/i> what President Dwight D. Eisenhower did in 1956, less that sixty years ago, with the building of the Interstate Highway System.

    They’re doing exactly/i> what President Juscelino Kubitschek did in 1957, less that sixty years ago, with the construction of Brazillia, a massive complex of government offices and worker housing imagined by Le Corbusier in the middle of the Amazon.

    They’re doing what we wish we could do here at ground zero.

    We’re starting with the entire city of New York surrounding it, not the empty, wind swept Mid-western plains, not the impenetrable, damp Amazon Jungle, not the arid Gobi desert, so you figure that we should not have taken ten fuckin’ years and we cant even get the glass right for the parapet surrounding the first ten floors.

    Of course, in China, they’re not hobbled by corporate greed which has grown to staggeringly massive proportions here in the West.

    They’re doing everything right.

    The fact that they shoot their criminals and harvest their organs is harsh, but tell me, if you could use that to keep people in line, wouldn’t you? Instead of treating their prisons as profit centres, they regard them as societal costs to be minimized.

    Their strategy is truly long-term.

    The currency will, not may but will, fluctuate on Wall Street and the bankers wont like it, but the buildings will still be standing there, welcoming and waiting for the populace to move in.

  11. msbpodcast says:

    I kept following the links of Bloomberg and it was eye opening.

    I loved the juxtaposition of China’s real-estate boom, compared to Las Vegas real-estate bust.

    In China they’re hopeful that people will move in and take care of the buildings. They’re waiting for people to get off the farm or move out of over crowded cities, into the space that’s ready and waiting.

    In Las Vegas, where way fewer buildings are just as empty, its considered a catastrophe. They’re foreclosing on everybody, throwing them into the street, declaring an enormous loss (making us pay for it while the banks make record profits,), and abandoning the real-estate to the tumble weeds and the prior residents to live in shabby rentals.

    That says a lot about who’s got the better, more hopeful life.

  12. msbpodcast says:

    I hope Mr. Obama successor doesn’t forget to turn out the lights in the White House on his way out in 2025.

  13. mriegger says:

    I’d rather the Chinese build 20 empty cities than build 20 carrier battle groups.

  14. deowll says:

    #13 I can only concur.

    High speed rail in China is not showing a profit if I recall correctly. Neither are these cities. Build it and they will come is old soicalist/progressive central planning thank.

    It has produced a very long track record of failed utopias. When you allow people to build based on what people actually need things tend to work out.

    When you build based on your or some other elites vision for a better future you normally end up with a money pit that meets the needs of almost nobody.

    I suspect the nail in the coffin for these cities is that people want to build factories near the coast to simplify logistics connected with the import export business and these places are nowhere near where they need to be.

    It is pretty much the problems the greens have with renewable power. You can look at the map of where large amounts of wind power is available and look at our cities and find not much overlap.

    We could build wind farms and towns in these thinly populated locations in the Northern heartland of our nation but are people going to actually move there?

    Not until the places they are living have to be abandoned for economic reasons they aren’t and even then these locations are unfavorable for international trade. The only thing they have to commend them is an abundance of wind power.

  15. Speter says:

    Maybe wrong about this, but Planet X altering poles causing continental shifts, is a common meme. While i don’t believe it, others do and will act on info they have. Some have suggested that all these ghost town is for after the pole shift, there will be cities for relocating the elites and workers. this is because most of the rest will be under water.

    now if these cities are above 300m above sea level, near a water source, away from coast, etc then it adds a bit to the theory at least..

  16. chris says:

    #11

    Yup.

  17. foobar says:

    No different that the ghost towns in Florida or Dubai.

  18. green says:

    These ghost towns are meant to house workers from countries whose debt china owns.

    Your T-Bills are useless so send us factory workers as payment.

  19. Gumbi says:

    Mr Green,

    I think they would put the Chinese workers in the swank new places, tell them they earned it (True that!), then put the new slaves in the dumps and tell ’em to get to work.

  20. moe says:

    The video up top is part of a weeklong series by Adam Johnson. Here’s today’s part 2:

    http://tinyurl.com/3kjjkba

  21. martron3000 says:

    Nice new apartments at reasonable prices? Where do I sign up? I wouldn’t mind living in a “ghost city”. Quiet, no traffic, no crime, what;s not to like?

  22. Floyd says:

    #22: The Chinese built properties that their own people can’t afford. It’s really hard to make a profit on an apartment if no one can afford it. Instead, take a loss, sell the apartments at very low prices, and people will come.

    The new owners of the apartments can fix things up and everybody wins. It’s better than having a country that’s effectively a giant Potemkin village.

  23. MrProfile says:

    it looks like Minecraft in creative mode
    also I would love to have stop lights with a count down like they do over there


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