a) survivorship bias, and b) long-termism.

Many nations have tried to plan their economy. Most perform badly and end up as footnotes in the history of the Democratic Republic of Tinpotonia. It takes a lot of skill to plan an economy.

The star performer in living memory was South Korea: best dictatorship! But it completed its succession plan and pivoted to free markets, so the example is forgotten.

Mao kicked off by outlawing sparrows, causing famine. His rule survived that, but it could have gone very differently.

Xi, and Wu before him, are probably just good at it. Even so: the demographic problem.

I would say that democracy has inherent problems: electability is a poor proxy for leadership quality; election cycles nullify the long-term view; electorates are incompetent and vacillating. I expect a committee to choose better rulers than hoi polloi, except in the dimension of accountability to the populace.

> I would say that democracy has inherent problems:

It is indeed the worst possible system except for all the others.