Because it’s a huge source of revenue: [F]or a long time, the fee [paid by parents for extra-legal births] has been collected and spent in opacity, without even a hint as to how revenues generated from it are allocated in most local governments’ annual budgetary reports. On July 11, 2013, Youshui Wu, a lawyer from Zhejiang … Continue reading Why Doesn’t China Just End Its One-Child Policy?
Fallows wonders whether it will succeed: Through its 30-plus years of economic modernization, China has seemed to stick to efficient levels of corruption. Connected families got very rich, but most families did better than they had before. An increasingly important question for Xi Jinping’s time in office, which bears on the even more urgent question of whether … Continue reading China’s Anti-Corruption Campaign
Keating details the new change to China’s one-child policy (OCP): Under the new system, couples will be allowed to have a second baby if either parent is an only child—a significant slice of the population given that the policy has been in place since 1980. This isn’t quite as dramatic a change as it sounds. China has … Continue reading China’s One-Child Loopholes
The one-child policy (OCP) alone doesn’t account for the shortage of females in the country’s population: [A]n NBER working paper by economists Douglas Almond, Hongbin Li, and Shuang Zhang makes the case that the roots of the gender imbalance go back farther than the OCP. Specifically, they argue that it was the pro-market land reform … Continue reading Why Is China Missing So Many Women?
After spotting a new government poster in Beijing showcasing a smiling family with two kids, Evan Osnos speculates: [T]he Party propagandists may be on to something. Two-child families may not be so far over the horizon after all, because of a growing consensus that economic pressures demand a change. “China’s shooting itself in the foot” with the … Continue reading Is The One-Child Policy On Its Way Out?
Nicola Davison provides a rather dire snapshot of matchmaking efforts in China: A lack of young women – a result of the skewed rate of baby boys born under China's one-child policy – means an estimated 30 to 50 million men will be without a wife in 20 years. Sushma Subramanian and Deborah Jian Lee … Continue reading Modern Love In China
Two economists suggest that China would be a more peaceful place if it had more women: [Jane] Golley and [Rod] Tyers are building off existing research, which confirms that China’s crime rate has doubled over the last 20 years and that incidents of social unrest have risen from about 40,000 in 2001 to over 90,000 in 2009. China’s imbalanced sex ratio is likely a … Continue reading Too Many Angry Young Men?
China recently passed a law requiring adult children to visit their elderly parents. Xiaoqing Pi takes note of the first case: A Chinese woman and her husband have been ordered to visit the woman’s elderly mother at least once every two months, and during at least two public holidays every year, in the first application of a new … Continue reading Visit Mom, Or Else
Evan Osnos tells the story of a Chinese woman forced to abort her baby: She had violated the one-child policy. Two shots were injected into her belly, and on the morning of June 4th she gave birth to a stillborn baby girl. Afterward, while she lay on a metal-framed hospital bed, her sister took a devastating … Continue reading When An Abortion Isn’t A Choice
A reader writes:
While I agree with Susan Newman that having an only child doesn't necessarily mean that child will be predisposed to selfishness and bossiness, there are still other factors to consider after adolescence. While I have two wonderful younger brothers, my wife is an only child. Two months ago, her mother passed away unexpectedly. It was a very difficult time for us, and still is, but her comment that struck me more than any other was: "I've never wanted a brother or sister more in my life." She felt so alone, and when around her father, she felt like she had to be "on"; he needed her to be supportive.
Another reader, an only-child, makes related points:
The Dish 