在中文电子游戏中，“斩杀线”指战斗者所处的危险血量阈值，而在过去一个月里，这个词从玩家聊天室迁移到政治宣传中，“美国斩杀线”被用来概括所谓美国之“错”与中国之“对”。这一新用法据称由一名在西雅图的中国生物学学生在哔哩哔哩直播中提出，并在数日内走红；到12月下旬，官媒把它当作可用的信息框架加以放大。

官媒文章常引用三组数字：约77万美国人无家可归、37%的美国成年人无法用储蓄覆盖400美元的紧急支出，以及一个四口之家需要13.7万美元年收入才能避免贫困。反驳者则指出，按长期口径无家可归者占比低于0.05%，将可推迟的可选支出计入后“无法覆盖紧急支出”的比例约为10%而非37%，且13.7万美元作为真实贫困线的说法已被经济学家系统驳斥。

这种迷恋也折射出中国自身的压力：房价较五年前峰值下跌约20%，青年失业率为17%，蓝领工资增幅微弱且明显低于前十年的常态。研究还显示，自2018年以来中国中等收入人口增长显著放缓，而过去十年悲观情绪上升，“软锁”式停滞的风险被描述为比“斩杀线”更突出。

In Chinese video games, the “kill line” is a perilous health threshold, and in the past month the term has shifted from gamer chatrooms into political agitprop where the “US kill line” is used to summarize what is supposedly wrong with America and right with China. The politicized usage was attributed to a Chinese biology student in Seattle livestreaming on Bilibili and became widely known within days; by late December state media amplified it as a ready-made message frame.

State media pieces often cite three figures: about 770,000 Americans are homeless, 37% of US adults cannot cover a $400 emergency with savings, and a family of four needs $137,000 a year to stay out of poverty. Critics counter that chronic homelessness affects less than 0.05% of the population, emergency shortfall estimates fall to about 10% when deferred discretionary spending is considered, and the $137,000 “poverty line” claim has been thoroughly debunked by economists.

The fixation also spotlights China’s own pressures: home values are down about 20% from their peak five years ago, youth unemployment is 17%, and blue-collar wage gains are tiny versus the prior decade’s norm. Research further points to a dramatic slowdown since 2018 in the growth of China’s middle-income population alongside a rise in pessimism over the past decade, framing the risk as “softlock” stagnation rather than a single “kill line.”

Source: China obsesses over America’s “kill line”

Subtitle: It is easier to talk about American harshness than Chinese malaise

Dateline: 1月 15, 2026 05:53 上午