The People’s Bank of China recently published a working paper on China’s demographic transition, which not only advocates full liberalization of childbirth, but also mentions the need to control housing prices and emphasize science education, and says “one of the reasons why Southeast Asian countries fell into the middle-income trap is that they have too many liberal arts students”.
The paper, published by the People’s Bank of China (PBOC), has already caused a lot of controversy, as reported by the media today.
The paper, written by four PhDs in economics from the PBoC’s Research Bureau and Institute of Finance, emphasizes that the content is the authors’ personal views and does not represent the PBoC.
The paper says that the dire demographic situation China faces should fully liberalize and encourage childbirth. “The paper says, “Don’t hesitate to wait and see the effect of the existing policies, but let go of the policy while some residents want to have children but are not allowed to do so, because it would be useless to wait until everyone doesn’t want to have children.
In addition, the article proposes countermeasures to deal with the demographic transition, including: emphasizing savings and investment, promoting pension reform, and promoting education and scientific and technological progress.
In promoting education and technological progress, the paper says China’s development is shifting from factor-driven to innovation-driven, which first requires a relaxed environment and “a good balance between innovation and regulation”; secondly, a basic social security system should be established; thirdly, housing prices should be controlled; and fourthly, education should be emphasized.
Innovation and entrepreneurship depend on young people, but they mostly don’t have money, the paper said. “How can we talk about innovation when the housing prices in a city are so high that they are forced away.”
In terms of education, the paper also specifically mentions the importance of science and technology education, and says that “one of the reasons why Southeast Asian countries fall into the middle-income trap is that there are too many liberal arts students.”
However, many Chinese netizens are not convinced by the negative comments about “too many liberal arts students”, saying that the causality of this statement is weak; moreover, Chinese people have a strong sense of “science”, and many of them chose to study science and technology when they were students in order to find jobs. However, in the real environment, except for the computer information industry, many talents in science and technology may not have a good environment and salary.
Recent Comments