Word: decrepit
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...lack of cable TV in Harvard's dorm rooms is indicative of the administration's comprehension problem when it comes to student quality of living. Facilities such as the MAC, with its decrepit weight room and lack of basketball court space, and Loker Commons, which failed as a student union, show how far out of touch the administration often is with how students wish to use their leisure time. Administrators do not seem to understand how much students enjoy being able to hang out in a comfortable union or work out in a nice gym. Providing cable television would give...
...hospitals to the Internet, projects that Russian officials have begged Washington to fund. He plans to set up desperately needed training programs for business managers, lawyers and local government officials. And Soros has begun consulting with U.S. health officials on funding tuberculosis treatment in Russia's provinces and decrepit prison system...
Liang, at least, is earning money. Not from his official job at the factory making electrical machinery. That decrepit state enterprise hasn't paid him regularly in three years. Like everyone else with any gumption in Shenyang, Liang has turned to moonlighting, with his bosses' eager blessing. There are just three choices for independent entrepreneurs here: restaurants, but that takes capital and there are few customers; street vending, but that requires a product to sell; and driving a cab. Liang chose the cab, a ramshackle Lada he must hot-wire each time he starts it. He rents...
Chaos has already come to China: its name is Guangzhou. This southern madhouse of a city lashes the nerves. Noise. Dirt. Pollution. Crowds. Blinding neon ricocheting off mirrored towers. Ceaseless tearing down and building up, with no visible organizing principle, just decrepit neighborhoods vanishing into gaping construction holes. It is Hong Kong without the veneer of British order, capitalism out of control. This is the world of money, money, money; a city that never sleeps, with dress shops open at midnight and vendors hawking at dawn. No wonder its presiding genius is Deng Xiaoping, smiling down from a giant mural...
...true market economy cannot emerge fully until the government does something about its ailing state enterprises. These decrepit firms, employing some 100 million workers, are swamped by debt, surplus labor and bloated inventories. Their out-of-date equipment and Marxist management, corrupt and incompetent, make them hopelessly uncompetitive. Half the 100,000 enterprises operate at a loss, and one-third barely turn a profit. At one time or another, half of all state employees have been furloughed or have had their pay or hours cut. Workers earn most of their income moonlighting for private firms...