How Can We Make Better Estimates of Chinese Economic Output?

Chinese economic figures are unreliable and they are overestimated rather than underestimated. The output of an economy is highly correlated with a lot of other data points that can be observed without the help or interference of government organizations. Li Kaichang, the Communist Party official who admitted that their GDP figures were man-made, very candidly discussed that the only three things he looked at to evaluate the economy was electricity consumption, rail cargo volume and bank lending.