China's Central government has far stricter demands from local governments than Albania, and is a Confucian society, where "mianzi" (face) is paramount. It is very important that things and people look successful. Albania and the rest of the Balkans have a Balkan mindset. Current generations suffered a lot during the 90s, and showing success used to always invite unnecessary attention, which is why people in the balkans even if successful, would not show it in order not to jinx it.

China has invested more percentage wise from it's economy into infrastructure, which is what leads you to think that it's advanced, has incredibly educated and competitive younger people due to the education cult in the country, and has DEVELOPED level first and second tier cities, with diversified economies. They are even better than major city in developed countries, since they don't suffer the consequences of radical leftist policies and have almost no petty crimes and are very clean (due to low salaries for countryside labour force).

China will continue to so well and look good for the next 15 years, after that we will see what happens. Fertility rates are far worse than Bulgaria, Albania and the rest of Europe. New generations are getting smaller and smaller and the population is declining. China is too big to count on labour import andtaht  is socially unacceptable anyways, so China's future depends on the robotics industry and AI. If they make a breakthrough, they can keep things as they are. If they don't, infrastructure will start getting neglected and will get harder and harder to find hardworking people from the countryside, ready to work for pennies.