Quality of life in China

Wow, that even surprised myself after putting those three words "Quality", "Life" and "China" in one sentence.
When I grew up in Beijing during the great Culture Revolution (1966 - 1976), "Quality of life" had a quite different meaning.
Food: limited quantity of pretty much every kind of food based on number of family members. Use of a "coupon book" and coupons for just about every essential household item.
Clothing: white shirt, dark blue pants and Mao's suit. Most popular item among young people is the green soldier's cap.
Housing: state owned apartment buildings. Apartments are assigned by working places to workers again based on number of family members, years of service and rank.
Media: What bad news? Everything's great, the whole nation was moving at light speed to modern civilizations. Let's not forget that there was still "class struggles" between the anti-revolution individuals and the people, but they were no near to stop the "wheels of the advancing history" - "li4 shi3 qian2 jin4 de che1 lun1".
Entertainment: gr8 modern Beijing operas. There were 8 total of these so-called modern Peking operas what
Travel: 22 hours, Beijing to Shanghai express train in 1969. Down to 17 hours in 1987. Rode in a Beijing Jeep (Chinese version of the Jeep way before the Beijing Cherokee in late 80's) once, rode in some Russian brand sedan once on a trip to the Ming Tombs outside (then) Beijing because neighbors' high ranking relative's visit. Never had an airplane ride before 25.