>Chinese officialdom regurgitated that official line to me.

So why not give some credence to the point if its coming from a presumably subject matter expert?

> even if Beijing elites gave as tiny bit of concern

The issue is more complex than elites from ZhongNanHai not caring, after all, every official who climbs up has to go through shit tier postings before advancing and has every incentive to succeed. The fundamental issue is China is massive and difficult to manage, especially after misguided purgings of political equity. There is only so much attention and resources to go around. Otherwise wouldn't need five year plans to prioritize. Edward Luttwak roughly summarizes this phenomenon as Great State Autism, rulers of large countries have so much on their plate, yet attention of decision makers who are ultimately human can not scale linearly with population. It's harder modernizing a massive country where every segment of society must be developed. China is not a middle country with US protection umbrella where the population can coast through on a few key industries. Add on indigenous defense, space, nuclear programs and other geopolitical considerations and it's like comparing building regional franchise into a multinational compared to running a mom-and-pop shop that has sponsorship from rich family. An alternate reality where the entire country got commiserate growth is a world where China ran 20 years of 20-30% growth. That expectation is fantasy.

> biggest curse of China as it is now

This is very true. Hence, Xi, and actual believer seems like the most suitable person for the job. Central / western cities Chengdu, Chongqing, Wuhan, Chansha etc grew under him. Efforts to limit growth of large cities to spread development into smaller centres. Hukou reforms. So I take his focus on balanced interior growth more seriously - "pending focus on neglected interior development". It's one of the largest reasons I find his centralization of power justifiable. I didn't think elites gave a fuck under Hu, now they're forced to. But ultimately there's only so much that can be done given real life constraints. The possibility space is limited and all things considered the cards have been well played in the last 30 years. New constraints in the next 30 are going to be harder.

> needing to be disposed off, walled off, and forgotten of

I'm confused why you think "non-salvageable rural poor" is my position when I'm hoping they'd be put to good use while you (seem) to think high quality factory workers are exhausted and resign to the fact that nothing will be done. I want more to be done, and think more will be. Just less optimistic that much can be. A bunch of technical schools and good management isn't going to add demand for 600M well paying jobs.

> I feel the same sense of resignation, and defeatism

I am resigned to the fact that 1.4B cannot possibly be elevated to western living standards in their lifetime, but I am optimistic their lives will see steady improvements if only because the bar is so low in the first place. Rebalancing inequity and redirecting development so 1000rmb end up 2-3000rmb over the demographic decline cycle would go a long way in terms improving QoL.

> rode the manufacturing train for at least one more decade at full speed

Could you elaborate on why you think this is possible.