This week on Sinica, Kaiser chats with Damien Ma, managing director and co-founder of the Paulson Institute’s think-tank, MacroPolo. Damien discusses MacroPolo's new forecast of the property market in China and the likely impact of the predicted contraction of that market. Damien also offers advice on what smart China-watchers will be keeping their eyes on in the coming, highly political year in China in the leadup to the 20th Party Congress. And he shares the amusing story of what happened the evening after he last appeared on Sinica way back when.

2:58 – Damien recalls how he nearly led Sinica's interns to their doom one fateful night in 2014

7:23 – MacroPolo's forecast of the property market through 2025

16:28 – How will local governments fund themselves without land sales?

20:11 – Damien's take on Xi Jinping's "common prosperity" agenda

28:53 – Understanding China today through the lens of scarcity

30:49 – Tips for watching developments in China in this political year

40:00 – Cool stuff from MacroPolo

A transcript of this conversation is available on SupChina.com.

Recommendations:

Damien: Derek Thompson, "America is Running on Fumes," in The Atlantic.

Kaiser: Peter Jackson's epic Beatles documentary Get Back on Disney+

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