For most of history, when a society gets richer, the rich enslave more people and consolidate power, and then ultimately try to be worshiped as gods until the masses push back enough, and then become content with simply having absolute earthly power.
Maybe this trend is over, but given the amount of effort into putting out "God Emperor" memes in the US, my guess is that some people are at least willing to still try at it.
At any rate, I'm not sure a graph from the US starting at 1950 is sufficient for establishing historical trends.
This is not true. The enormous rise in wealth of the world in the 20th/21st centuries has coincided with large increases in personal freedoms as well.
At any rate, I'm not sure a graph from the US starting at 1950 is sufficient for establishing historical trends.
The trend is consistent with other datasets:
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/2/2e/US...
This makes sense. As people get richer, they use some of their wealth to "purchase" more leisure time. There is no reason to think this won't happen in China, just like it has happened in other places.
I think your fear is unfounded.