Chinese Prime Minister Li Keqiang said at the two sessions held on May 28: China is a developing country with a large population. Our per capita disposable income is 30,000 yuan (RMB, the same below, about S $ 5,900), but there are some, but some have some, but some have some, but some have some, but some have some, but some are some, but some have some, but some are some, but some are some, but some are some, but some are some, but some are some, but some are some, but some are some, but some are some.The low -income and below of 600 million, their average monthly income is about 1,000 yuan. It may be difficult for 1,000 yuan to rent a house in a medium -sized city, and now they have encountered an epidemic.After the epidemic, people's livelihood was important.
This data aroused heated discussions from all walks of life because it simply revealed that China, which is already the world's second largest economy in the world, reached a $ 10,000 economy in the world.
Li Keqiang's disposable income here refers to the income after deducting personal income tax, private transfer payment, and various social insurance premiums, and is based on family, including the labor population, the elderly, children, etc.All family population.Li Keqiang's data has both statistical support and support of sample survey data.
According to the number released by the National Bureau of Statistics of China, the per capita disposable income of the nation's residents in 2019 is 30,000,733 yuan.In the same year, the per capita disposable income of urban residents was 42,359 yuan, with a monthly average of about 3500 yuan.The per capita disposable income of rural residents is 16,021 yuan, with a monthly average of about 1300 yuan.Therefore, the average monthly income of rural residents is close to 1,000 yuan in itself.The income of farmers in poor areas is lower.In 2019, the per capita disposable income of farmers in poverty -stricken areas was 1567 yuan, and the average monthly income was about 966 yuan, and the monthly income was 1,000 yuan.
The research group of China Investment Distribution Research Institute of Beijing Normal University, in 2019, the survey of 70,000 representative samples in 2019 shows that 39.1%of the monthly income of 39.1%of the population is less than 1,000 yuan, and the number of converted population is 547 million.; The population with a monthly income from 1,000 yuan to 1090 yuan is 52.5 million, and the total population with a monthly income of less than 1090 yuan is 600 million, accounting for 42.85%of the national population.This is consistent with the population scale of about 1,000 yuan with a monthly income of about 1,000 yuan.
The survey report of the Beijing Normal University also shows that among these 600 million people, 5.46 million people have zero revenue, 220 million people have a monthly income of less than 500 yuan, 420 million people have a monthly income of less than 800 yuan, 550 million people, and 550 million people.The monthly income is less than 100,000 yuan, and the monthly income of 600 million people is less than 1090 yuan.If the standard of 1090 yuan to 2,000 yuan is used as the standard of low -income income, the population of the group will reach 364 million.In other words, the number of Chinese monthly income of less than 2,000 yuan has reached 964 million.
The survey found that among the 600 million people, the ratio from rural areas is as high as 75.6%, and the proportion of distributed in the central and western regions is 36.2%and 34.8%; the average education period is 9.05 years.The following proportion is 43.7%, the proportion of illiteracy accounts for 9.6%; non -labor force accounts for 37.1%, and the proportion of self -employment accounts for 18.0%, while salary employment accounts for only 37.4%, which is obviously lower than other than others.Income group.
In general, the typical characteristics of these 600 million people are that most of them are in rural areas, mainly distributed in the central and western regions, and the family population is huge.Most of them are self -employment, family employment or unemployment, or simply withdraw from the labor market.
Whether it is statistical data or a sample survey of the Beijing Normal University, the results are actually the phenomenon that people can observe, and it is consistent with people's common sense.Recently, the economic development of the stalls has explained a big problem.The epidemic cracking on the bottom of society is just one of the reasons for the economic recovery of the stall.The stall economy is not ridiculed by people, nor is people inherently loved to set up the stalls, but forced by actual life.
China's middle class is still weak
Since the reform and opening up, although China has contributed to more than 800 million people from poverty and is a miracle in the history of world economy; however, people must realize that poverty mentioned here is just poverty in an absolute sense.It is not to say that there is no poverty to get rid of absolute poverty. Many people not only have been in a relatively poor state for a long time, but also return to an absolute poverty state.This can also explain why the Chinese government has put precise poverty alleviation in the top policy agenda since the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China.
It is not difficult to observe this national conditions in China.It is easy to see without comparing with developed European and American countries. It is easy to see alone with the East Asian economy.Japan and Asia Four Little Dragons (South Korea, Singapore, Hong Kong and Taiwan in China) have not only achieved high -speed economic growth in more than 20 years after the economic take -off, but also created a huge middle class, making the middle class reach 60%to 60%to70%.China is different. Although it has also achieved high -speed growth, after more than 40 years of reform and opening up, the middle class is still less than 30%.
Why are so many people surprised by this basic country?There are at least a few reasons.
At the social level, China is currently a typical business society.Although it is great to measure whether a country is great, it depends on how many people in this country have been separated from poverty, instead of depending on how many rich people have cultivated this country, the concern of society is still the rich.
At the level of knowledge, scholars are mostly capital economists or capital social scientists to speak for wealth.Although economists speaking for wealth is a universal phenomenon, they have never surrounded wealth like Chinese economists.Former Prime Minister Wen Jiabao once complained that China has no poverty -stricken economists.However, this is the basic fact that speaks for the poor.At the same time, although there are 800 million people from poverty in China, there is no economist or social scientist to make this phenomenon clearly.
At the political level, in recent years, nationalism, and nationalism after reform and opening up have different properties.China is reforming and opening up because of backwardness, and pursues prosperity through learning from developed countries.Since entering the new century, nationalism has begun to transform into a sense of pride in the rise of the country, and this emotion has been stronger in the younger generation.Although this nationalism or patriotism is spontaneous, it can cause a bad consequences when walking through the head. It can only be said that the country is good, and it cannot be said to be bad.The differences between the income and social differentiation of the Gini coefficients often become sensitive concepts.Many scholars also cater to this public opinion, overemphasize the achievements of the country without talking about or even covering up the problems existing in the country.
In fact, the wealthy wealth also causes the international community's misunderstanding of China.Because nationalism has increased with the growth of wealth, Western hardships use this as the basis for Chinese threat theory.
The long -term existence of China's national conditions can be understood from China's economic growth.Compared with the East Asian economy, China's economic growth has several significant characteristics.
First, unfair growth.The growth of the four dragons in Japan and Asia shows fair growth. The fairness achieved by these economies is rare in the history of world economy.This is why the middle class of these society is relatively large.Different economies have cultivated the middle class through different methods, such as Japan's lifelong employment system and revenue multiplication plan, small and medium -sized enterprises in Taiwan and Hong Kong, and public housing policies in Singapore.After the 2008 World Financial Crisis, these economies began to have a serious phenomenon of income differences.
China is not.Early rural reforms and urban reforms showed fair growth.After joining the World Trade Organization, the economic growth rate, but the difference in income is getting bigger.This is a common phenomenon in the world, and China is no exception.This wave of globalization has created a huge amount of wealth, but most of the wealth is in the hands of a few people.In the West, the middle -class society has evolved into a richest society.Although China does not produce a rich society like Western, the situation is extremely severe.
Second, whether it is the status of the middle class or the population of poverty, the foundation of the social system is insufficient.In any society, the basic social system is based on the supply of public products such as medical (public health), education and public housingGive it.In the field of public products, China not only did not have enough institutional construction, but was damaged.The industrialization and commercialization of the medical field began in the late 1990s; after the Asian financial crisis in 1998, the industrialization of education was industrialized; the real estate industrialization after the world financial crisis.As a result, the new three mountains people called.If the standards of the middle class are mainly reflected in the economy, these social public products that guarantee the status of the middle class.Furthermore, without these public products, the poor will never have an institutional guarantee for poverty alleviation.
Third, technical creation has sufficient kinetic energy, but lack of actual ability.Scientific and technological innovation is basically a middle -class phenomenon, because on the one hand, after meeting the needs of basic life, people have the energy to enrich innovation; on the other hand, innovation is risky, and groups above the middle class can bear innovation.risk.China's innovation is basically in the management and operation model, or the innovation of technical application, and there are few original technological innovation.
China must pursue fair growth
The history of China's reform and opening up can be said to be a tragic history of being separated from poverty and pursuing the prosperity.In fact, this is also the historical theme since modern times.China eventually chose the path of socialism, because people believe that more capitalism, socialism can more effectively achieve the wealth of most people.In view of the situation of poor socialism before the reform and opening up, Deng Xiaoping proposed the glory of the rich and the prosperity of some people to get rich first and follow the path of collective richness.Deng Xiaoping has established two themes of China's reform and opening up in the future mdash; mdash; development and fairness.
The transition from a planned economy to a market economy will inevitably cause the rich and the poor.In the first ten years of the new millennium, the Chinese economy has achieved high -speed growth because of its previous market -oriented reforms and the joining the world trade organizations, but the division and consequences of society have continued to emerge.The Chinese government began to turn to social construction.The 16th National Congress of the Communist Party of China put forward the concept of a harmonious society and the scientific development concept.Although economic growth is the last word, people must ask what growth.Not all forms of growth are conducive to society. What China is pursuing is fair growth.
Since the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, the Chinese government has mentioned the issue of social fairness on the agenda.Over the past many years, the government has mobilized and invested a large number of people's property, and vigorously promoted targeted poverty alleviation, prompting 10 million people to get out of poverty each year.
China's leadership is highly sober for China. The previous leaders have adhered to two basic judgments, that is, internally, China will be in the primary stage of socialism for a long time; in the outside world, China will have long -term developing countries.
In the world, the severe situation facing the bottom of society today will not be overestimated.The epidemic has caused impact on all strata of society, but the most impact is the bottom of the society.The national violence caused by American racial issues, although on the surface, is a racial problem, is essentially a problem of class or class.If black people cannot change their positions or classes, racial problems will continue to erupt.
China must be considered to be precepts.As discussed earlier, the bottom of Chinese society is still huge, society is still fragile, and the crisis cannot be tossed; and the middle class that is not very large at all lacks sufficient institutional foundation.
Around the 19th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, through institutional reforms, the leadership of the ruling party was consolidated, and now it has shifted to reform and opening up again.On May 11, the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and the State Council issued opinions on the acceleration of the socialist market economy system in the new era. Earlier, on April 19, it had issued opinions on the establishment of a more complete factor market -oriented system mechanism.These are all signals to deepen market -oriented reform. It is a programmatic reform document after the decision to comprehensively deepen the reform of the comprehensive deepening reforms.
At the legal level, the National People's Congress has just passed the long -awaited civil code, which is the most important legal achievement after the construction of the Fourth Plenary Session of the Eighteenth Central Committee of the Eighteenth Central Committee.In terms of opening up, after the earlier series of open policies, the two sessions passed the overall plan of Hainan Free Trade Port during the two sessions, and began the related work of Hainan Free Trade Port Law.These are a big step than the open policy, that is, the form of law should be used to ensure the open policy, so that the openness of the country is not transferred by political will.
In contemporary, whether it is Western experience or the experience of the Asian economy, it shows that before the middle class of society does not reach 60%to 70%, there is no solid economic foundation for social stability.EssenceHowever, even after reaching 60%to 70%, the reform still cannot stop.The rise of populism facing the United States (and West) today is the problem of constantly narrowing in the middle class.
The strength of the outside depends on a strong internal middle class.The strength of all developed countries lies in the huge output class, because the middle class is synonymous with consumer society.
If Deng Xiaoping is still alive, he will definitely say humility that China has not solved the two main problems of development and fairness, that is, neither solve the problem of making big cakes nor solve the problem of allocating cakes.
Now, the reform has set off, but it is still far away from the journey of a wealthy and fair society.Based on the poverty population still accounts for the majority of this country, people can only resort to action without any space for pride.
(The author is a professor at the National University of Singapore and East Asia)
The article only represents personal point of view
