Can China Escape the Damage Done by Its One Child Policy?

During China’s Fifth Plenary Session of the 18th Chinese Communist Party (CCP) Central Committee, a high-level meeting of top CCP members, the government officially reversed the One Child Policy, allowing all Chinese citizens to have two children.  This marks a major relaxation of Chinese population control policies and allows greater freedom for Chinese families.

During China’s Fifth Plenary Session, Chinese officials discussed the government’s plans to promote economic growth for the next five years. This meeting was particularly important because of the recent deceleration of the Chinese economy. Top-level Chinese officials and economists have been debating whether or not 7 percent GDP growth should be considered the “New Normal” for Chinese economic development.  The Fifth Plenary explicitly states “medium-high” level growth as the GDP target for the next five years. Many speculate the Chinese government reversed its policy to spur economic growth and adjust the bias towards an aging population.

In 1979, Deng Xiaoping, the paramount leader of China from 1978-1992, implemented the One Child Policy in order to restrict population growth.  The policy was designed to expand opportunities for the average citizen and reduce aggregate resource consumption due to overpopulation.As a result, the Chinese birthrate has fallen to approximate 1.55 births per women, reducing the expected population growth by several hundred million.

However, due to a propensity for the Chinese population to prefer male births, the policy indirectly promoted a large gender imbalance.  This gender imbalance stems from families aborting female fetuses in order to birth a male son.  According to some estimates, China will have 32 million more men than woman.  This imbalance not only has created social unrest in China but also has encouraged illegal activities such as widespread human trafficking.

The policy has also caused a problematic age distribution. As the Chinese population ages and leaves the workforce, the incoming youth will have difficulty supporting the elderly. In addition, with fewer workers entering the labor force, maintaining Chinese economic targets will be difficult with lower aggregate labor productivity. Declines in GDP growth will likely depress aggregate income, which will affect the government’s ability to fund entitlement and social support programs.

Although many have argued that China’s reversal of the One Child Policy is an acknowledgement of its failure, Chinese officials would disagree.  Government officials would likely contend that they were cognizant of the potential negative impacts of the One Child Policy, including both the gender imbalance issues and an expanded elderly population. Many Chinese officials believed that once the Chinese population had sufficiently decreased, the government would ultimately revise population management legislation to promote a 2.1 births per women model (which is the rate at which population growth remains constant).  Therefore, from China’s perspective, the revision of the One Child Policy was expected.

Only time will tell whether or not the economic and social performance accompanied by the policy will outweigh the potential negative consequences. In trying to curb population growth, the Chinese government may have underestimated the significance of these potential negative impacts and overestimated the ability to change population trends in the future.

The negative impacts of China’s decreased labor pool will likely cost billions.  For example, the problems related to a rapidly aging population will continue to burden future economic growth.  Moreover, the policy incurred many human rights violations including forced abortions and sterilizations, the encouragement of human trafficking, and the imprisonment of families refusing to follow the One Child Policy. Although the change in policy will reduce the potential for future human rights violations, the two-child cap will not completely eliminate these dangers.  Once more, China must deal with the institutional problems. For example, human trafficking syndicates will not immediately dissipate after the change in policy is implemented.

In addition, increasing the birth rate will be difficult.  After China eased the One Child Policy in 2013, there was a disappointing bump up in the birthrate, resulting in an increase of 1.45 million children born. The recent relaxation of the policy will likely also minimally increase the birthrate. The major factor preventing an increase in the Chinese birthrate is the systemic cultural impact of the original One Child Policy. Many citizens, including both rural and urban Chinese, willingly chose to have one child. Removing the government restriction may not substantially encourage the average family to have an additional child. Thus, the Chinese government may have to take additional and potentially costly measures to achieve a 2.1 birth rate model.

The One Child Policy has created problems that the Chinese government must now resolve.  Although the policy has been revised, the government faces an uphill battle to solve these economic and social issues. The task is difficult and China may have dug a hole for which it cannot escape.