What the US can learn from China's infrastructure boom | Ian Bremmer Explains

On Ian Explains, Ian Bremmer breaks down how the US and China are both betting their futures on massive infrastructure booms, with China building cities and railways while America builds data centers for AI. But are they building too much, too fast?

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What do the US and China have in common? They’re both restless, ambitious, and addicted to growth. On Ian Explains, Ian Bremmer breaks down how both countries are betting their futures on infrastructure. Over the last two decades, China has been on a building spree—everything from high-speed rail to mega dams, bridges, and entire cities. Meanwhile, the US is spending record amounts on data centers, grid upgrades, and microchip supply chains, the technological infrastructure that will power the next wave of AI.

But China’s experience is both a roadmap and a warning. The results of its building spree have been astounding: more high-speed rail than the rest of the world combined, soaring GDP growth, hundreds of millions lifted into the middle class. But the People’s Republic is now dealing with a stagnating economy. Local governments that financed all that construction are drowning in debt. China bet on physical infrastructure. The US is gambling on digital. If AI doesn’t deliver on its promise, both could end up in the same place: buried under the weight of their own ambition.

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GZERO Media, a Eurasia Group company, is a multimedia publisher providing news, insights, and commentary on the events shaping our world. Our properties include GZERO World with Ian Bremmer, our weekly show on US public television; our newsletters GZERO Daily, GZERO AI, GZERO North, and GZERO Daily with Ian Bremmer; our parody series Puppet Regime; our digital video series including Ian Bremmer's Quick Take every week; and the GZERO World Podcast. Our content is free and available at https://www.gzeromedia.com/.

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