the 5.2% is just a figure the bureau of statistics made up to make sure they hit xi Jing ping's goal of 5% for the year.

even china bull Ray Dalio thinks China in a lost decade or more https://www.forbes.com/sites/williampesek/2024/03/29/ray-dal...

GDP growth figures published by e.g. the IMF are not just verbatim replications of what a country says. It comes from extensive analysis, verification, cross referencing against other data, and validation. It's why IMF data will often differ not only from what a country says, but even from what other organizations such as e.g. the World Bank or UN might say, as the latter are also independently carrying out their own similar processes. But all figures tend to fall pretty closely, because under this scrutiny it's practically impossible to meaningfully fudge things.

China needs 8-9% growth for 20 years to get to the GDP per capita of US/Western Europe.

5% isn’t going to cut it.

It has a massive overhang of real estate and big demographic headwinds.

The middle income trap is looking more and more a possibility.

China's population is more than that of the US and Europe combined.

China doesn't need to reach the same GDP/capita as the West in order to attain the same level of economic power. Even with only 50% of Western GDP/capita, the Chinese economy would as large as the US and EU combined.

> The middle income trap is looking more and more a possibility.

The "middle income trap" is related to an inability to move up the value chain. Given that China already leads in many growing high-tech sectors, it already looks like China has blown past the middle income trap.

But nobody cares about who has the “largest” economy if the GDP per capita is middle income.

China has absolutely not blow past the middle income trap. 600M live on less than $140/month according to Chinese statistics.

If they hope to get anywhere close to the standard of living of developed countries they will need to quadruple the size of their economy which even at 9% would take 2 decades.

China's GDP/capita is about 12,000 USD, which is somewhere between Mexico and Poland. Average monthly income in China is about 1400 USD, which is 10x the level you cited.

The middle income trap is about countries getting stuck, because they are unable to transition from cheap manufacturing to higher-value-added industries. China has already moved into high-tech sectors in a big way, so it looks like the middle income trap is already irrelevant for China.