How Does “Rich Get Richer” Widen China’s Wealth Gap?
With the booming economic in China recently, the wealth gap also widens in a much rapid speed. In an article posted in South China Morning Post, Ruan claims that as the rich get richer against a background of party privilege and corruption, the widen wealth gap brings a real threat of social unrest.
For example, Cai Bin, a political commissar of the urban management bureau in guangzhou’s Panyu district, was one of the latest disgraced officials to be placed under party investigation after internet users found that he owned 22 properties valued at more than 35.5 million yuan. An elite class formed around senior officials continues to set up an expand businesses unhindered because of their unlimited power. This cycle will go forever as their children can afford expensive elite schools and better educations.
This is related to Deng Xiaoping, who initiated the China’s economic reform in 80s, allowing “some people to get rich first”. Beijing’s policy have largely focused on efficiency and growth while ignoring equality. The economy, now the world’s second largest, grew an averaged of 10% in a year in the last ten years.
Now China’s focus has been shifted from the rapid economic growth to eliminating the poverty in undeveloped rural area. It’s not easy because while the rich gets richer, the poor gets poorer because of their limited resources and disadvantaged environment. Education seems to be the only fair way for the lower class to move upward. However, the poor usually tend to quit schools or lose in the severe competition because of financial burdens.
This article mainly focuses on the obvious side. On the other hand, what should the government do to break the rich gets richer phenomenon? In fact, China has been successfully increased the social mobility in the past decades compared to other advanced area such as the US and Europe. It is because China has the world’s largest college entrance exam, and it is relatively fair. Many people from poor families change their lives by getting into top universities and making significantly more money. After the “rich gets richer”, other people are benefit from them. For example, the more advanced places in China such as Shanghai, Beijing, Guangdong are assigned to help the less developed area in terms of industries and educational resources. Without regulations from the government, the rich would always get richer, which is the case in the most parts of the world. But the government should always responsible for stopping this phenomenon by providing helps to people in need.
Reference: State of Inequality as China’s rich get richer
https://www.scmp.com/news/china/article/1076538/state-inequality-chinas-rich-get-richer