Do they? They live in apartments, drive cars, take the bus, eat many of the same foods from the same chains that we do here. What's so different?

Yeah, ok, they can't march into the street in protest of their government, but are they really that much worse off in the material sense?

Before you break out the numbers - keep in mind that while they make far less than Americans, their cost of living is similarly lower. I find the Chinese urban middle class lifestyle to be comparable to the American middle class lifestyle, sans a few things like a huge backyard.