HK was an important opening to the rest of the world when China was closed. China was able to source limited imports and do some exports through HK. So HK was just for ideological convenience (we shun westerners! But we still need some of their money and exports, so let's do biz through HK). Obviously, HK isn't required for that anymore. Likewise, HK used to be the place to get actual Chinese entertainment that the mainland wasn't capable of producing due to ideological constraints...that barrier has almost went away as well.
These day, HK's only remaining use has been as a proxy for the conflicts between different factions of the CCP. But even this is tenuous, as evidenced by the book store employees being disappeared a couple years ago (books being an important tool for pointing out or making up the crimes of the other faction).
These day, HK's only remaining use has been as a proxy for the conflicts between different factions of the CCP. But even this is tenuous, as evidenced by the book store employees being disappeared a couple years ago (books being an important tool for pointing out or making up the crimes of the other faction).