Michael Schuman warns that the country will face "some sort of terrible collapse" unless its policymakers engage in real reform:
[W]e can see the pieces of a crisis falling into place: excessive, misguided investment, including a giant property boom, propelled on by debt and the decisions of government bureaucrats. Sound familiar? A crisis, of course, is not inevitable — if China’s leadership takes action and reorients the direction of the economy. The positive thing is that at least some top policymakers understand the need to change. In policy pronouncement after policy pronouncement, the government pledges to reform. The problem is that China’s government is not taking its own advice. The economy needs to rebalance away from investment and exports to a more consumption-driven growth model with a primary focus on quality of growth, not high rates at any cost. That’s not happening, or not happening quickly enough.
The Dish 