how much of that is because half of the country is still incredibly poor? broke dudes living in coffin apartments and poor rural villagers don't emit a lot of carbon. kinda like their meme about the dude in an apartment who just has a mattress and a PS5 causes less waste, etc.
Okay and? Wouldn't the fact that their population is 4-5x larger also mean that it makes sense for them to pollute more? And regarding your first point, I don't see how that's relevant to China polluting more or less per capita. They still do pollute less per capita.
What's your suggestion then? For China to reduce its population by 3/4 (wasn't China heavily criticized for enforcing birth-control?), or to acknowledge that Chinese citizens (or those of any other country with a population greater than that of the US) don't deserve to enjoy the same standard of living as US citizens?
and their population is 4-5 times larger.