I think the protesters will offer a different slant. From what I've read, they genuinely understand that what is at stake is their freedom to choose their own path. They've watched as China has gradually taken control of the governing body, the media, the financial management and the police. Each transpired more or less over a number of years, but each was also worrisome and that worry and anxiety pent up. The trigger for the current mass-action was not an economic event, it was a judicial one: A new law was proposed that would enable any court in China to charge and then extradite a Hong Kong resident without checks by Hong Kong's judges. Effectively, it would mean that Hong Kong's judicial system was subordinate to China's judicial system, and therefore, did not have a judicial system at all.
There have been many foreboding events that portend the loss of liberty that Hong Kong residence fear. Liberty is what they are fighting to keep. Not wealth.
Addendum: The Chinese judicial system is as one with the communist party. It does not operate the same basic law that Western countries, and tenuously Hong Kong, operate. Under China's judicial system, people literally disappear for months or more with no information provided to family or employer. Many times, they never return.
There have been many foreboding events that portend the loss of liberty that Hong Kong residence fear. Liberty is what they are fighting to keep. Not wealth.
Addendum: The Chinese judicial system is as one with the communist party. It does not operate the same basic law that Western countries, and tenuously Hong Kong, operate. Under China's judicial system, people literally disappear for months or more with no information provided to family or employer. Many times, they never return.