http://www.economist.com/blogs/analects/2014/02/chinas-economy
China is usually thought of as a producer and not much as a consumer. In 2010, China surpassed Japan as the worlds second largest economy (after the United States), however not in consumption. It was not until 2013 that China surpassed Japan as the world's second largest consumer. Japan just released information stating that their private consumption was 292.9 trillion yen, about $3 trillion dollars, and government consumption was about 98.5 trillion yen.
Although China has not released their numbers for 2013, the Economist knows enough to conclude that Japan indeed has fallen into third place. Japan's private and government consumption are only about 43% of China's total GDP. This comes from the fact that the yen is losing value to the yuan. It is thought that China was the country that provided the most economic growth to the world economy is 2013.
China has a 1.3 billion population and is growing at extremely rapid pace. China not too long ago eased its policy on one child per family. With the easing of this law allowing certain families to have more than one child it brings along some problems. China is the most populous country in the world and according to the article 43% of China's GDP goes towards consumption alone. With the easing of the one child policy I can see percent of consumption in China to continually skyrocket. 43% towards consumption is already a huge number and if it continues to increase then China can face major problems including mass poverty, disease, and possibly a collapse of the infrastructure of the world economy itself.
ReplyDeleteThe one-child policy has reduced a population of 400 million since it was first introduced 30 years ago and it had been made a great impact in China. It also causes problems such as increasing aging population, "leftover men". The Chinese government had taken serious consideration before they decided to reform the policy. By looking China's extremely rapid economic growth over the past few years, the problems that Austin mentioned above will not take place in a long period of time before the government make changes on the policy. Also, according to United Nations, "India will surpass China to become world's most populous nation around 2028, with its population crossing the 1.45 billion mark, according to latest report by the United Nations". In this case, India should be the one who should consider to think about making changes on its birth policy.
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