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Comment by seanmcdirmid | Hacker News Reader

It is difficult, only 8.17% were Han in Tibet according to the 2010 census (probably higher now, but far from 50%), not including military stationed there. Even with the subsidies they are providing, life is fairly hard in Tibet due to the high altitude. Even the high altitude areas of adjacent provinces (which were formerly part of Tibet) don't have many Han in them.

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And that's crazy to me.

I would have figured that with the CCP having ~1.5 billion people to choose from, that they could move a few million Han into Tibet (current pop. according to google: 3,648,100).

Even just 1-2 mil could potentially accomplish the CCP's goals?

This is made more difficult by the fact that Tibetans tend to have biological adaptations to life at that altitude which Han Chinese lack.

China isn't that socialist, there is no strong social safety net waiting to bail you out if you move to Tibet. If they can't make a life for themselves in Tibet, they would simply be left to die, so why take the chance?

Yes in contrast to Xinjiang you can't economically develop Tibet.

Even the CCP can't move mountains. Tibet is only good for tourism.

Xinjiang, especially north, has a lot of farm land, a lot of natural resources that are easily accessible, as well a lot of urbanization and industry already. There is a reason it has 25 million people while Tibet only has 2 million. It is already 42% Han, which makes the ethnic tensions with the Uighurs a lot more explosive.

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