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China's new economy beset with problems
On the one hand, China's much-heralded economic growth during the last quarter century is unprecedented in world history. Annual incomes of the Chinese have more than quadrupled, from about $1,000 per capita to more than $4,000. At the same time, China is plagued by massive internal migration, officially disclaimed unemployment and an economically crippled and crippling collection of state-owned enterprises. An estimated 10 million people each year leave China's farms for its cities. This migration poses huge social and economic problems. And, with well over half of China's population still living in rural areas, there is no end in sight. While Chinese officials claim low unemployment rates, the country's population of 1.3 billion belies the significance of this claim. At the end of 2000, the official estimate of the unemployment rate stood at slightly more than 3 percent. While this may seem low by Western standards, it translates into more than 20 million unemployed. Most observers believe the official statistics understate the extent of unemployment. According to the Chinese newspaper People's Daily, in the last six years China's state-owned enterprises, which still account for about 60 percent of output, laid off more than 28 million workers. To put these numbers in perspective, overall employment in goods-producing industries in the United States has declined by about 3 million workers since its peak of 25 million in 1973. Posted by: Steve White 2004-10-10 |
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