Thanks Trump.
Futurology
It’s like comparing diarrhea to poop.
China is authoritarian, but if you look only at the material conditions for democracy like prosperity, peace, education they are better than the US. People fundamentally want to exist and raise families in peace without constant terror, confusion and economic hardship. That is because even they are authoritarian, they can still "afford" to have pro-human or pro-national ideology. In the neoliberal countries choosing that over profit gets you fired or sidelined.
America is the biggest police state in human history that breaches more other nations' sovereignty than anyone in history. you are out of your gourd saying "China is authoritarian" compared to the US, the biggest bully of all time with kill counts in the tens of millions
What you are calling "authoritarianism" in China is actually the power of the proletariat, a radical and unrelenting democracy.
Western democracy has revealed glaring problems with selecting governance, especially if the majority of the media is captured like in the US, and if elected officials have to beg special interest for money or be chosen / filtered through that process, or has to lie to the electorate. That China is doing relatively well despite being authoritarian, not having to be corrupted through that mechanism of election (an alternative might be sortition to prevent filtering for the worst vipers). But it's also lucky in that it's a "benign" authority still based on socialism and that it's not an enemy or plaything of the US. But even though it works for the people (for the people) it's not democratic (by the people)
Partially that is because China derives it's treasure from the people so education and productivity are important and with that some quality of life. There are plenty of pro forma socialist governments that only care to enrich themselves based on natural resources and can just brutalize and neglect it's population. So it's not just because of socialist ideology, it's where the money is for China. And afaik China still has it's corruption problems.
But even though it works for the people (for the people) it’s not democratic (by the people)
More Democratic than the US