You forgot to mention why Hong Kong's economy and port boomed before 1997 - because those rich families who left Shanghai after 1949 brought capitals and business opportunities to Hong Kong.
Certainly. And HK's relative liberty and autonomy has continued to attract people fleeing China's regime (and the HK umbrella movement had quite some support from them, was my impression).
And it's wonderful to see that mainland China is now catching up, at least on the economic front.
Wikipedia: 1950's "Skills and capital brought by refugees of Mainland China, especially from Shanghai, along with a vast pool of cheap labour helped revive the economy."
1950s: "The People's Republic of China was established in 1949 under a reorganised Communist Party. As many as 100,000 people fled to Hong Kong each month under the new regime, many of whom were rich farmers and capitalists who brought with them management experience, though even more were criminals who established the influential triad society in Hong Kong."
1960's: "The surge of refugees continued to come in from China."
In the 1980's, when return to China became a possibility, "the warnings of the 1997 handover raised emigration statistics to historic highs. Many left Hong Kong for the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Australia, Japan, and anywhere else in the world without any communist influence."
