Chronicle Of A Decline Foretold

China is on the eve of a demographic shift that will have profound consequences on its economic and social landscape. Within a few years the working age population will reach a historical peak, and then begin a precipitous decline. This fact, along with anecdotes of rapidly rising migrant wages and episodic labor shortages, has raised questions about whether China is poised to cross the Lewis Turning Point, a point at which it would move from a vast supply of low-cost workers to a labor shortage economy. Crossing this threshold will have far-reaching implications for both China and the rest of the world. This paper empirically assesses when the transition to a labor shortage economy is likely to occur. Our central result is that on current trends, the Lewis Turning Point will emerge between 2020 and 2025. Alternative scenarios—with higher fertility, greater labor participation rates, financial reform or higher productivity—may peripherally delay or accelerate the onset of the turning point, but demographics will be the dominant force driving the depletion of surplus labor.

China's current account surplus has declined to around one-quarter the peak reached before the global financial crisis. While this is a major reduction in China's external imbalance, it has not been accompanied by a decisive shift toward consumption-based growth. Instead, the compression in its external surplus has been accomplished through increasing fixed investment so that it is now an even higher share of China's national economy. This increasing reliance on fixed investment as the main driver of China's growth raises questions about the durability of the compression in the external surplus and the sustainability of the current growth model that has had unprecedented success in lifting about 500 million people out of poverty over the last three decades. This volume examines various aspects of the rebalancing process underway in China, highlighting policy lessons for achieving stable, sustainable, and inclusive growth.

China's rise over the past several decades has lifted more than half of its population out of poverty and reshaped the global economy. What has caused this dramatic transformation? In China's Great Migration: How the Poor Built a Prosperous Nation, author Bradley Gardner looks at one of the most important but least discussed forces pushing China's economic development: the migration of more than 260 million people from their birthplaces to China's most economically vibrant cities. By combining an analysis of China's political economy with current scholarship on the role of migration in economic development, China's Great Migration shows how the largest economic migration in the history of the world has led to a bottom-up transformation of China. Gardner draws from his experience as a researcher and journalist working in China to investigate why people chose to migrate and the social and political consequences of their decisions. In the aftermath of China's Cultural Revolution, the collapse of totalitarian government control allowed millions of people to skirt migration restrictions and move to China's growing cities, where they offered a massive pool of labor that propelled industrial development, foreign investment, and urbanization. Struggling to respond to the demands of these migrants, the Chinese government loosened its grip on the economy, strengthening property rights and allowing migrants to employ themselves and each other, spurring the Chinese economic miracle. More than simply a narrative of economic progress, China's Great Migration tells the human story of China's transformation, featuring interviews with the men and women whose way of life has been remade. In its pages, readers will learn about the rebirth of a country and millions of lives changed, hear what migration can tell us about the future of China, and discover what China's development can teach the rest of the world about the role of market liberalization and economic migration in fighting poverty and creating prosperity.

Homepage for the publications of the CECC. Titles cover various topics related to China. The Congressional-Executive Commission on China was created by Congress in October, 2000, with the legislative mandate to monitor human rights and the development of the rule of law in China, and to submit an annual report to the President and the Congress.

" In 1978, China launched economic reforms that have resulted in one of history’s most dramatic national transformations. The reforms removed bureaucratic obstacles to economic growth and tapped China’s immense reserves of labor and entrepreneurial talent to unleash unparalleled economic growth in the country. In the four decades since, China has become the world’s second-largest economy after the United States, and a leading force in international trade and investment. As the contributors to this volume show, China also faces daunting challenges in sustaining growth, continuing its economic ransformation, addressing the adverse consequences of economic success, and dealing with mounting suspicion from the United States and other trade and investment partners. China also confronts risks stemming from the project to expand its influence across the globe through infrastructure investments and other projects under the Belt and Road Initiative. At the same time, China’s current leader, Xi Jinping, appears determined to make his own lasting mark on the country and on China’s use of its economic clout to shape the world around it. "

This book analyses the economic consequences of the regional government of Catalonia's challenge to democracy and the rule of law in Spain. This process, started in 2010, culminated in a coup d'état in the autumn of 2017. The book has three parts. First: The circumstances behind the challenge: economic structure, social and political aspects. Second: The economic impacts of the resulting huge political instability and social polarisation, and the downturn in GDP, investment, competitiveness, Barcelona's appeal, and flight of companies and banks to Madrid. Third: Independence would mean collapse of trade with the rest of Spain and the EU, expulsion from the eurozone, fall of GDP, plummeting tax revenue, soaring unemployment and, finally, conversion of this hypothetical new Catalonia into a failed, vassal and totalitarian state. This book is destined to be the foremost work of reference on the consequences of the separatist threat to Spain, including Catalonia's current decline.

Following Deng Xiaoping's economic reform and opening (Gaige Kaifang) policy, China experienced unprecedented high growth for over three decades. Crucial in the process was the role of Zhu Rongji, who was hand-picked by Deng initially as Executive Vice-Premier and later full Premier to carry through the needed reform and manage the critical marketization process through the turbulent 1990s when China's economy suffered many ups and downs. Dubbed as China's 'Economic Czar', Zhu tackled many thorny problems associated with the country's then half-reformed economy ably and effectively, thereby laying the ground for subsequent periods of greater dynamic growth. Zhu was instrumental in preparing China's economy for its final take-off.The chapters in this volume were originally written as 'policy briefings' for the Singapore government from 1997 to 2003 when Zhu was Premier. They cover a wide variety of topics including how he had applied his own way of 'macroeconomic control' (Hongguan Tiaokong), how he went about reforming taxation, foreign exchange and state-owned enterprises, and finally his embrace of capitalism. Each chapter is preceded by a detailed introduction highlighting the main issues and interpreting them from today's perspective based on updated information and additional new research.