Based on my own experience, Chinese society contains traditional thoughts from the feudal era, collective thoughts from the socialist period, and utilitarian thoughts brought by capitalist development, but it uniquely lacks individualism.
( Translate by AI tools: 1. Only by enduring the greatest hardships can one become the best of men. 2. Only by enduring the deepest hardships can one rise above their original social class.)
It's hard to translate, I'd like to demonstrate with code:
if(you '吃苦' && '吃苦' && '吃苦' && '吃苦' && '吃苦' ){ You will have a better future. You will have a good job and a good career. You will get to a higher level than others. ..... }
Sometimes "吃苦 & 吃得苦中苦，方为人上人" encourages people to overcome difficulties. Keep going and conquer it.
But it contains a logical flaw: it treats "吃苦" as a necessary even the only key for success.
In recent years, some young people have changed "吃得苦中苦，方为人上人" to ""吃得苦中苦，一直要吃苦", which means: If you used to "吃苦", you get stuck in this quagmire of "吃苦", you will always need "吃苦" (on the other side, someone enjoys life on your behalf)
They "comprehended" that maybe "吃苦" was been designed. It's "designed" to drives low-level people to bear poor conditions and overcome difficult problems and hard work. but as a low-level young people they found that "only themself 吃苦 and other people enjoy ". It's not fair, maybe it's wrong. So they change the maxim.
Young people start thinking, not just follow.
Ideally it means a population which is educated, rational, and mature enough to rise to the challenge with minimal prompting and direction. But if that fails, stronger persuasion becomes necessary - which may mean sanctions and enforcement.
US (and UK) individualism struggles with this, which creates a weaker, less resilient, and more dangerous low-trust high-paranoia society for everyone.
The Chinese are more used to 吃苦, which is an alien concept in the US.
You can take that too far - and arguably China has - where there's a complete lack of concern for individuals.
The ideal is a balance, and I'm not sure either culture has it.