Min Rui is a special commentator on cultural affairs. The article reflects the author's opinions and not necessarily those of CGTN.

In late 2025, a term from gaming culture–"kill line"–went viral on Chinese social media. In video games, it marks the point at which a character's health drops so low that a single strike is lethal.

Applied to the real world, it captures a harsh reality in the United States: a job loss, medical emergency, or unexpected bill could push an ordinary person from stability into destitution almost overnight.

This is what a livestreamer using the pseudonym Alex told Chinese netizens about his part-time job as a forensic assistant in Seattle, where he observed that thousands of Americans live just one shock away from destitution, with virtually no buffer between the middle class and homelessness.

His bizarre and macabre stories, from Halloween nights in Seattle's icy rain, to handling corpses and overflowing morgues, helped him gain 500,000 followers in just one month. Clips and transcripts of his videos, together with unsettling firsthand accounts, continue to reach an even wider audience.

You may doubt the accuracy of his descriptions, but you cannot look away from the numbers: According to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, homelessness in the United States rose to 771,480 people by late 2024. Many were not chronically poor but formerly working- or middle-class. A Federal Reserve report from May 2024 to May 2025 found that 37 percent of American adults could not cover a $400 emergency expense without borrowing or selling assets.

What caught Chinese netizens' attention was less America's hardship than the sheer improbability of it: How could people fall so quickly into destitution in a nation as wealthy and powerful as the United States? In China, by contrast, encountering outright poverty or homelessness is a rare sight.

The contrast lies not in wealth, but in societal structures and cultural practices.

Long before modern banking, Chinese households cultivated habits of prudence. Personal savings are more than practical–they are a cultural reflex. Centuries of proverbs about "preparing for a rainy day" have instilled a cautious approach that allows individuals to weather sudden shocks, reflecting a long-cultivated wisdom in daily life.

For thousands of years, Chinese society has treated the family as the smallest unit of social governance. Confucian thought, crystallized as early as the Western Han Dynasty (202 BC-8 AD) in "The Book of Rites," envisioned a society where "the elderly are cared for, the capable employed, and the young nurtured." This was not moral ornamentation but a guiding principle. Responsibility flowed outward– from family to community to state– to create overlapping layers of protection.

As a result, Chinese family life can often appear messy, or even intrusive: relatives entangled in one another's affairs, obligations that do not end at adulthood, and expectations of mutual support that many Westerners would find suffocating. Yet this web of relationships acts as a safeguard. When illness strikes and jobs are lost or savings run dry, individuals are rarely left to face financial collapse alone.

This ethic extends into governance today. China has institutionalized these principles through a dense web of social protections. From neighborhood-level assistance to nationwide medical insurance, from minimum livelihood guarantees to targeted poverty alleviation, the system is designed to prevent people from hitting absolute rock bottom.

A vivid example of this spirit can be found in Shenzhen, where a public food bank has quietly become a lifeline for those in temporary difficulty. Supported by the local government, community organizations and volunteers, the program redistributes surplus food to low-income families, migrant workers, and individuals facing sudden hardship. It operates not as charity alone, but as a shared social responsibility –one that reflects a deeply rooted belief that no one should be left to struggle alone. Such initiatives embody the everyday ethics of mutual aid, turning the abstract values of solidarity into tangible support for those in need.

By 2024, over 1.36 billion people, more than 95percent of China's population, were enrolled in basic medical insurance. In 2021, nearly 100 million rural residents were lifted out of poverty under the official national standard (per capita annual income below 2,800 yuan, or $300) – a scale and pace unprecedented in human history.

China's approach goes beyond individual households to regional coordination. Wealthier provinces and cities are paired with less-developed areas through industrial cooperation, personnel exchanges and financial support, ensuring sustainable development rather than temporary relief.

This is not merely about income; it reflects a vision of national cohesion: China's 56 ethnic groups and diverse provinces are expected to progress together toward shared prosperity. Economically disadvantaged regions in Xinjiang, Xizang, Sichuan and Yunnan have been transformed in recent decades, lifting millions out of poverty and significantly raising living standards.

The same ethos extends to disaster relief. Following the recent earthquake in Taiwan's Hualien, the Chinese mainland contributed cash and supplies worth 20.875 million yuan ($3 million) through various channels to help affected residents recover and rebuild. This response reflects the belief in collective unity and the idea that people on both sides of the Taiwan Strait are one family.

China's approach reflects a long-standing philosophical continuity: the principle that people are the foundation of governance. For more than two millennia – from Confucius' social vision to Zhu Xi's synthesis (1130-1200) and onward to the present day – Chinese thinkers have emphasized that the well-being of ordinary citizens forms the essential basis of social and material prosperity.

Objectively, it reflects a fundamental truth: without people, there can be no state. This wisdom remains instructive in the contemporary context, as it underpins the mission of the Chinese Communist Party: to seek happiness for the people with the goal of national rejuvenation. A commitment to a people-centered approach is a key component of Xi Jinping's political thought and a recurring theme in his public addresses.

Meanwhile, in the United, yet divided, States, each state tends to play its own game. California wrestles with its wildfire and homelessness crises largely alone, while the federal government juggles a tight budget under the looming threat of a shutdown. In such a system, the people who fall behind often do so due to limited institutional support, even when aware of personal risks.

Ultimately, the deeper question is not which system is better, but what values quietly shape a society's choices. A truly resilient society is not defined by how many success stories or billionaires it produces, but by how it treats those who stumble along the way.

When ordinary people are pushed to the brink by illness, sudden loss, or misfortune, the measure of a civilization lies in whether its institutions, communities, and moral instincts step forward to offer support – or quietly look away.