“To get rich is glorious.” In the 1980s, this was one of the most famous sayings – unofficially, at least – to describe the ethos at the dawn of the opening-up period in post-Maoist China.
China’s paramount leader of the time, Deng Xiaoping, apparently justified this unorthodox situation for an ostensibly egalitarian Communist country by saying: “First you let some make money, then more will follow.”
