The tone of Economist articles on China is so weird it just highlights all the shortcomings of the journalism. A lot of it is 'government does standard government thing', 'business does standard business thing' but retold as if they are describing exotic alien life-forms they've just encountered for the first time and can't comprehend their strange customs.

> An executive with a big Chinese tech firm says that, at their core, the robots are finicky devices which are liable to overheat and wear down. China’s infamous “996” working culture—9am to 9pm, six days a week—might overwhelm them.

Was the train of thought here "Oh No! Their tech executives sound sane, informed and reasonable, add a weird dig to undermine them immediately afterwards"?