Judging by this you have no real world experience in the matter but regurgitate what is said to you.
That's fine. I will take words of those who lived during both periods of time. Only ones who complained the most, were the ones who fled to buy up property in Vancouver BC to hide their millions.
As this post points out here
https://www.techpowerup.com/forums/...nys-blitzchung-ban.259942/page-2#post-4130249
Anyway, the numbers shown don't lie either.
I am not regurgitating anything. Simply an understanding of economics, been to both countries and speaking to the people there and observing their behavior. Also that chart really doesn't help your argument and really just reaffirms what I said earlier once you bring China's data, USA and Canada's data.
That chart shows growth and productivity for the most part has been consistent prior to control by China. Did I say Hong Kong would go into a recession when it returned to Chinese power? No I didn't. There is going to be some economic benefit from the spillover from China becoming a more wealthy country which turns into investment in Hong Kong. But prior to that they were doing well and the growth isn't anything unusual when compared to other 1st world developed economies.
As a result, that chart shows is simply consistent growth and how healthy Hong Kong's economy and productivity were prior to even the chinese take over. if you look at the growth rate itself over that period of time, it is the same as the USA and Canada using the same source over the same period of time so it's not unusually strong(look for the USA and Canada data for GDP per capita).
Compare this to China's in the past and
the productivity and wealth were much worse off compared to Hong Kong prior to the take over.
Where the GDP per capita of China is around 3000 dollars, Hong Kong's is 22,000. So as I said, Hong Kong was doing well prior to Chinese control particularly compared to China. China was not doing very well until free trade and globalization made China the Ideal way for western companies to raise their profits. That is reduce cost in terms of manufacturing and labor to raise profits. Because wages in China were so low and China economy was undeveloped with little regulation, any savings when it came to manufacturing and labor would turn into profit for companies. This is why in the short run Wallstreet and capitalism love China and want to continue trade relation. However in the long run, this can have potentially a disastrous effect.
It's okay when it is largely unskilled manufacturing jobs because these jobs were not being doing by Americans or Canadians but when it starts hitting the middle class and hitting higher end jobs like Engineers, a brain drain starts(no demand for that job in that country) which results in the loss of an industry. E.g AMD graphic development. AMD graphics use to be developed in Markham Ontario. AMD could not afford it, so they layed off most of the engineers and off shored the development to China. What incentive does AMD have to bring all those Job's back to Markham when it can be done in China for 1/4 the cost(engineers make 25k there vs the 100k+ here). Now largely graphic development is gone in Canada which means that money is gone. Getting completely off topic, but what it demonstrates is why China's economy was allowed to explode compared to the rest of the world.
China has improved much more than Hong Kong with 566% growth vs 80-90% over the same period. Compare this to the growth and how much China has grown and it demonstrate the catch up effect I mentioned earlier. Undeveloped economy have the biggest room for improvement where healthy more modern ones stagnate because they have less room for improvement which allow undeveloped economies to catch up to developed ones.
Have you been to Hong Kong and China? As I mentioned having lived in both countries for a bit, on top of the benefits I mentioned earlier, the most noticeable benefit I enjoyed in Hong Kong is the people in regards to education and civility.
Where I feel Hong Kong is busy, it simply a controlled competitive environment akin to New York with a higher population density. Be fast and efficient and you will do alright. However in China the manners and behavior that are normal in Canada are not there. Go to China(even a developed city like Shanghai) and you will see the population is much different. You will see people take a dump in the middle of the road, you will see fights erupt over the smallest things, driving is chaotic and if your in a line, you better watch your place because someone will bud in front of you.
A good demonstration of this is when Costco opened up in Shanghai.
Even the Chinese Government acknowledges this behavior which is why the social credit system is in place. I have experienced this behavior first hand and almost got into violent altercations.
When I was in Hong Kong, a family from mainland China quickly bud in front of me after I swiped my subway pass and sent two of their members in after I swiped my card. While my girlfriend got through, I could not get through because the pass would not allow another activation so quickly. So she confronted the family and asked them to pay for another pass so I could go through. It soon turned violent when they started swearing and the mother in the family picked up their child and told the child to starting hitting my girlfriend while using the child as a human shield. As my girlfriend was starting to take swipe at the mother, the husband took a swipe at my girlfriend and I was forced to jump the subway gate. This grew to a tense standoff where eventually the subway police took the family away. This was not the last time, I would almost got into a fight with a Chinese family from China.
Since your in Alberta, you might be able to picture this one in your head. I had a wedding to go to in Banff and I had rented a Canmore Cabin. I was doing a late check in so my keys were put in a Mail Box near the front desk office according to the staff there. There were no keys in the mail box. When I called the clerk, they said they did not know what was going on and to check the Cabin which had been allocated to me. As soon as I got there, I saw that it was occupied and it was a Chinese family again from China. They did not leave and were not willing to leave. They knew it was my room, I paid for it and were caught red handed because my name was on the envelope which the keys were in which I saw was on the table. They started to shout and eventually the front desk Clerk had to drive down. The front desk told them to leave as well since they did not pay for the room. They started to shout and eventually the neighbors in the surrounding cabins were getting angry. Eventually, the front desk clerk told the people in the room they would have to pay in the morning and I had to give me another cabin because involvement of the police would cause too much of a disturbance late at night for the other guests. I talked to the clerk the next morning and the family had skipped the bill by packing up and driving off.
Don't get me wrong, the educated Chinese that come to Canada and having earned a degree in China are good hardworking people. But my rudest encounters have been with people from Mainland China and it behavior that other people have observed as well.
After almost every “rude Chinese tourist" story, unfortunately, made SCMP.com's top-10 list, I decided to give the question some serious thought.
www.scmp.com
I also joined the masses in getting my refund on Warcraft 3 Reforged. 
