An economics, investment, trading and policy blog with a focus on Modern Monetary Theory (MMT). We seek the truth, avoid the mainstream and are virulently anti-neoliberalism.
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Thursday, May 10, 2018
Rogier Creemers — China's Social Credit System: An Evolving Practice of Control
This is the first detailed examination of the Chinese social credit system that is being introduced.
Imagine a world where nameless computers and faceless bureaucrats assign every individual a score. That is, they assign each person a value as a human being.
The decision of these nameless forces determines what kind of job, house, and spouse you can get. It determines whether you can board a train or a plane, and whether you can attend a restaurant or a tourist resort. It determines whether you can get a business loan, a mortgage, or medical care. It determines what kind of prison sentence you get if you are convicted. It determines whether you can go to school, or even go to the beach.
In short, imagine a U.S.-style credit score extended to every aspect of society. Imagine an Orwellian Big Brother beyond your worst nightmares. Imagine insiders being able to manipulate their score so they live like kings, while the masses suffer in squalor.
This is China’s “social credit” system. The nightmare is not coming. It is already here. It is now being put into place, whether Chinese people like it or not.
You thought you would see the Biblical “mark of the beast” in the West (i.e. mandatory universal microchip implants).
No. Its first appearance is in China.
“And he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads. And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name.” ~ Revelations 13:16-17
Some company was trying to give me a new credit card and kept pestering me, saying it was terrific deal, too good to miss, they would actually party me as I spent. That's how salesmen get people, they made them feel mad to say no because they say the deal is unbelievably good.
So I said send me the details so I can read up on it, but I was not really interested at all. Well, they did have the decency to write to me to say my application had been declined due to my credit rating.
Well, apart from my mortgage I had never had a loan in my life so I reckon that's why I was declined. For a couple of pounds they said I could write to a particular company to get the details of my credit rating, but I decided not to bother as I had recently read that people with no credit history often get poor ratings.
Imagine a world where nameless computers and faceless bureaucrats assign every individual a score. That is, they assign each person a value as a human being.
ReplyDeleteThe decision of these nameless forces determines what kind of job, house, and spouse you can get. It determines whether you can board a train or a plane, and whether you can attend a restaurant or a tourist resort. It determines whether you can get a business loan, a mortgage, or medical care. It determines what kind of prison sentence you get if you are convicted. It determines whether you can go to school, or even go to the beach.
In short, imagine a U.S.-style credit score extended to every aspect of society. Imagine an Orwellian Big Brother beyond your worst nightmares. Imagine insiders being able to manipulate their score so they live like kings, while the masses suffer in squalor.
This is China’s “social credit” system. The nightmare is not coming. It is already here. It is now being put into place, whether Chinese people like it or not.
You thought you would see the Biblical “mark of the beast” in the West (i.e. mandatory universal microchip implants).
No. Its first appearance is in China.
“And he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads. And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name.” ~ Revelations 13:16-17
In the US its called one's credit score. It's a whole lot more important than many people realize.
ReplyDeleteThe poor are shut out since they don't have a credit score.
Same in China. China intends to address this lacuna that marginalize a whole class of people through its social credit system that brings in everyone.
"The poor are shut out since they don't have a credit score."
ReplyDeleteYes. In the USA, having no credit score is worse than having a bad credit score.
I myself have no credit score, since I decline to be saddled with debt.
Therefore I am evil.
Some company was trying to give me a new credit card and kept pestering me, saying it was terrific deal, too good to miss, they would actually party me as I spent. That's how salesmen get people, they made them feel mad to say no because they say the deal is unbelievably good.
DeleteSo I said send me the details so I can read up on it, but I was not really interested at all. Well, they did have the decency to write to me to say my application had been declined due to my credit rating.
Well, apart from my mortgage I had never had a loan in my life so I reckon that's why I was declined. For a couple of pounds they said I could write to a particular company to get the details of my credit rating, but I decided not to bother as I had recently read that people with no credit history often get poor ratings.