Rebalancing a Divided China

AWSJ, 7 Sep 2012

By TOM ORLIK

Conventional wisdom says that China's poor save too much—improving the social safety net would encourage them to hit the shops and rev the consumption engine. The facts disagree.

A 2011 survey from China's South Western University of Finance and Economics found that 55% of China's households had little or no savings for the year. That busts the myth of industrious farmers and migrant workers saving to pay for education, health care and pensions.

The survey of 8,000 households also found that the top 10% of China's households control 86% of wealth and account for 56% of household income. That's a considerably higher share of income than the 32% suggested by the official National Bureau of Statistics data and points to a worrying level of inequality.

International and historical comparisons suggest China's wealth gap should be ringing alarm bells. Surveys in 1995 and 2002 found that back then China's top 10% controlled just 30% and 41% of wealth, respectively. In the United States, Federal Reserve numbers show the top 10% are eating 74% of the pie.

Concentrating wealth in the hands of China's few has implications for both financial and social stability.

China's rich are already buying passports and homes abroad. With such a high share of assets in their hands, if they all decide to leave at once, that would leave a big hole in the banking system. China's poor have acquiesced in an iniquitous system because their income is also rising; if that stops, they might not be so tolerant of entrenched privilege.

The main takeaway though is on the prescription for addressing China's consumption-light growth model. The government's efforts so far have focused on extending public health, education and pension services to reduce the need for household precautionary saving and to free up income to spend at the shops.

That won't do the job. The reason the mass of China's households aren't spending isn't because they save too much, it's because their incomes are too low. The reason the rich are saving isn't because they want to, it's because they have too much money to spend all of it. The best way to boost consumption in China is not through extending public services but through a more equitable distribution of income.

random pieces of information

Soybeans represent the US’ single-biggest export to China: $9.19 billion in 2009, topping the combined value of semiconductors and plastic materials, U.S. data show. (Source: I’ve forgotten)

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In America, one might call one’s professor “Professor So-and-so” in the beginning, but as the relationship grows closer, one might start using the Professor’s first name. (Source: My Japanese textbook)

(I didn’t know that!)

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All blue-eyed people are mutants. The first blue-eyed human only appeared about 5,000 years ago. (Source: QIkipedia)

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China has 446 million pigs – more than the next 43 pork-producing countries combined – and consumes half of the world’s pork each year.

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‘ HK citizen’ identity strongest in 10 years

From today's South China Morning Post. I found this significant, as despite increasing economic integration I think HK is still quite different from China. That and the fact that I was once rebutted, with the other party saying that Hongkongers increasingly view themselves as being PRC-Chinese.

Despite increasing economic integration, locals are viewing themselves more strongly as Hongkongers rather than Chinese citizens than at any time in the past decade, a survey has found.

The poll asked 1,016 city residents to rank the strength of their feelings as “Hong Kong citizens” on a scale from zero to 10, and found an average rating of 8.23 points, a 10- year high.

Asked the same question about their identity as “Chinese citizens”, the average rating was 7.01 points, a 12- year low. The poll was conducted from December 12- 20.

The University of Hong Kong’s public opinion programme has conducted such surveys from time to time since the 1997 handover.

Dr Robert Chung Ting- yiu, the programme’s director, said: “This [ trend] is contrary to the [ direction of] China’s economic development in recent years, so it must be due to factors beyond economic development.” But he stopped short of speculating about the reasons behind the fluctuations in these figures.

The pollsters combined all the survey results into an identity index on a scale from zero to 100. City residents’ strongest feelings of identity are as “Hong Kong citizens”, at 79.1 points, followed by “members of the Chinese race” at 72.5 points.

Then came “Asians”, at 72.1 points; “Chinese citizens”, at 67.9 points; “global citizens”, at 67 points; and finally “citizens of the People’s Republic of China”, at 61.1 points.

“The feeling of being ‘ citizens of the PRC’ was the weakest among all identities tested,” Chung said.

Dr Leung Hon- chu, principal lecturer at Baptist University’s sociology department, said some recent issues might have discouraged Hongkongers from identifying themselves as Chinese citizens.

He cited the vote- rigging scandal following Hong Kong’s recent district council
elections, allegedly linked to the central government’s influence in local affairs; and Beijing’s crackdown on dissidents such as artist- activist Ai Weiwei. The controversial security arrangements during Vice- Premier Li Keqiang’s visit in August could also have affected Hongkongers’ impressions of the mainland, he said.

“The sense of identity is not determined by the economic growth [ of a place]. Rather, it is related to whether they feel engaged in or contributing to the development [ of society as a whole],” Leung said.

“The narrowing of the difference between Hong Kong and the mainland in the political and cultural arenas may prompt fear among locals that democracy and human rights, honoured in the city, could be weakened,” he added.

Political scientist Dr James Sung Lap- kung said the weakening local sense of a “Chinese citizen” identity could be tied to a wide range of factors to do with China’s diplomatic relations as well as social and economic developments.

The recent Wukan protest over confiscated farmland, and demonstrations over a proposed power plant in Haimen , Guangdong, could have affected Hongkongers, Sung said. The small- circle chief executive election might also weaken people’s sense of engagement, making them believe Beijing was exerting its influence over the city, he said.

language and culture 语言文化

A Caucasian person who spoke fluent Mandarin was asked by a Chinese journalist: "您方便的时候我能问您一些问题吗？”(Can I ask you a few questions when it’s convenient?)

To which the Caucasian replied, “什么是‘方便’?”, confusing ‘convenient’ with what the guy below is doing:

I found this story really interesting, as it was surprising to discover that such a simple turn of expression could be lost on a non-Chinese who otherwise speaks fluent Mandarin – especially when it’s one which even the person with the poorest command of Mandarin i know would understand.

Singaporeans (of Chinese descent at least?) therefore still possess a certain amount of cultural advantage when dealing with the Chinese due to our heritage, environment and upbringing, and should use this to our advantage.

round 2

takeaways from the past few days:

• Wuhan has really bad air quality. Don’t plan on visiting till after the next 3 years, as all the construction and road works will continue till then.
• Try not to take China Southern flights from Wuhan to Haikou, Hainan. The plane we took was horribly old and cramped; the toilet door required some tugging before it would close; the main plane door took the cabin attendant at least 5 tries slamming it shut before she succeeded. It was a rather scary sight.
• the Intercontinental Hotel in Sanya, Hainan, has beautiful rooms and seems a good place for a romantic getaway (unfortunately i was alone). Here’re some pictures of the standard (cheapest) room there:

it even had a balcony you could rest and admire the view from – too bad it was really late by the time we got there, and we had to get up by 5am to catch our flight the next day:

architecture

I love the look of this building in Nanning, Guangxi, taken during the 7th China-ASEAN Expo held in October this year:

This convention hall is situated such right next to the expressways, such that cars will go one semicircle around this building, taking in its full magnificence, when they mount the expressway.

While Nanning a third-tier city, it possesses some buildings with fairly stunning architecture. I also passed by this public square cum park that was surrounded by tall buildings and was fairly impressed.

Ethnic minorities costumes

There’s a museum in Guangxi that features the costumes of various ethnic minority groups in the region. Guangxi itself has 1/3 of its population being from the Zhuang minority group, and it seems to do a fair bit in trying to showcase this group’s culture.

a display at the museum featuring an elaborate headdress:

the patterns on the material of their costumes are really intricate:

you hear so much about 绣球 from chinese shows, but it’s taken me nearly 25 years before i’ve actually seen a real example:

the museum also featured some really impressive traditional crafts.

lions and a dragon made out of reeds i think:

    

this is a type of bridge (built across rivers) that’s unique to this part of china. i’m not sure, but it might be a form of construction unique to the Zhuang group of pple:

and finally, some ladies decked out in ethnic costumes at the event i was at – the costumes are so pretty!

印象・刘三姐

Zhang Yimou has directed several outdoor folk musical/theatrical performances in China, and 印象・刘三姐 (“Impressions Liu Sanjie”) is one of them*.

I had the opportunity to watch 印象・刘三姐, set against the backdrop of Yangshuo’s impressive karst formations in Guilin. Most stunning was the opening scene, where karst outcrops were suddenly lit up.

The stage is a floating platform on the Li River (漓江) – in the darkness below lies the stage which extends out onto the river beyond:

for a sense of the scale of the performance’s backdrop – the bright spots of light in the foreground are actually flashes from cameras, while the lit structure is a pavillion used in one of the scenes. the setting was absolutely gorgeous:

Here’s what the performance area looks like in the day- the green things are the audience’s seats, while the stage is everything in front of it:

There are apparently about 600 cast members, all of whom are local fishermen. The opportunity to utilise such large amounts of manpower for a performance leads to stunning results – such a feat is only possible in China. This was just the first of several occasions where the sheer magnitude of China’s ‘people power’ was displayed.

A scene which featured the cast members carrying torches and running across the large stage. Beyond the left and right of this picture are also performance areas. I was quite impressed by how they were able to turn the flame on and off – i still haven’t figured out the trick behind the smoke-producing, switch-controlled torch.

This production is particularly known for its use of light i think, and it didn’t disappoint. The two streaks at the bottom-left are actually lengths of cloth:

Another example of the usage of cloth – all these people below were actually on a floating device that allowed them to glide over the water and the floating platform (that could be raised and lowered). Overheard in a conversation was that Singapore’s YOG opening ceremony might have borrowed some ideas from this performance, due to its usage of water – something which i quite liked actually!:

And here’s my favourite shot of that performance:

isnt it just spectacular?  All those tiny people – the white dots – are on their floating contraptions, getting ready to roll out the bolts of cloth.

Later in the performance, when the stage was completely dark, the performers walked out one by one in lit-up minority costumes and it just went on and on and on – i was totally stunned while trying to count exactly how many of them were involved in this section!

And then they did a whole series of things like this:

I really want to know how they did it! There was this particular segment where it was totally dark, then the costumes were lit up then turned off, one by one, at random areas on the stage. it was crazy, seeing this spot here illuminate then go off, then the next spot elsewhere on the stage, then over there, and over here, and so on.

I wonder if Singapore could pull off such a thing!

 

*: the others i know of are 印象・西湖 and  印象・丽江