[ceeplusplus]

Chinese savings are dumped into housing because the stock market isn't trustworthy there, not because everyone decided housing is the most productive enterprise.

Also, dumping your money into savings accounts is definitely better than dumping it into 30% APR BNPL offers for designer clothing and electronics. Or gas guzzling, expensive SUVs and trucks. Ask yourself why Apple has a 50% market share in the US.

> doesn’t make much sense to save for a future with limited returns (time value of life vs money and so forth).

Saving doesn't mean saving until retirement, it just means not spending beyond your means.

[iroh2727]

Well, saving is a virtue in itself (a virtue that most Americans don’t have I agree). But it’s really a separate issue. Suppose all Americans suddenly started saving 10% of their income. That would just establish a new standard of living, a new equilibrium.

The point is, though, that the population level class structure and socioeconomic mobility/opportunity would remain. As would the fact that the current generation cannot (as a whole) afford housing the way two generations ago could.

The narrative of “the individual” encourages non-elites to compete amongst themselves for a progressively shrinking portion of the pie. From the perspective of elites it has a twofold benefit: discourage worker solidarity and encourage productivity. From the perspective of workers, the latter benefit is good (we all should strive for competence and contribution), but the former is not good (even just in terms of life enjoyment). Also, at some point the pie needs a drastic and more balanced reallocation.