International Law

Anecdotal Evidence

By Stan

Last week’s blogging fell off a cliff due to work-related demands. Such is life. Hoping to get to Part II of my write-up on the WTO IP decision — look for that tomorrow if I can get my ass out of the office at a reasonable hour tonight.

On a less esoteric topic, the economy is a real bummer these days. Yes, sorry about being so judgmental, but someone had to say it. It is a big bummer all the way around. In addition to work-related effects, which I am contractually bound not to mention (upon pain of excommunication and sacking), I am starting to see signs of the slowdown in daily life.

I walk to work and therefore don’t pay much attention to traffic patterns. However, one day last week I had to make a long trek from Southeast to Northwest Beijing during rush hour, and then back again mid-morning.

I expected to be stuck in massive traffic both ways, with perhaps a worse situation during rush hour. Since 2003, traffic here pretty much sucks all the time.

I was surprised to make the trip very quickly. There were a lot of cars on the road, but everything was moving smoothly.

This could be an aberration, and it is of course possible that a lot of people have yet to return to the city after the long holiday. However, I am a suspicious and cynical bastard at heart, and I immediately took this light traffic as a sign of the apocalyptic economic meltdown.

Anybody have some better data on this from Beijing, Shanghai, elsewhere?

Full post as published by China Hearsay on February 09, 2009 (boomark / email).