China told women to have babies, but its population shrank again

China’s ruling Communist Party is facing a national emergency. To fix it, the party wants more

women

to have more

babies

. It has offered them sweeteners, like cheaper housing, tax benefits and cash. It has also invoked patriotism, calling on them to be “good wives and mothers”.

China’s

population

was 1,409,670,000 (or 1.4 billion) at the end of 2023, the National Bureau of Statistics said Wednesday.

The number of people in the second-largest economy fell by 2.08 million, or 0.15%. That was well above the population decline of 850,000 in 2022, which had been the first since 1961 during the Great Famine of the Mao Zedong era.
China said that 9.02 million babies were born in 2023, down from 9.5 million in 2022 and the seventh year in a row that the number has fallen. New births fell 5.7% and the birth rate was a record-low 6.3 births per 1,000 people, down from a rate of 6.7 births in 2022.

Taken together with the number of people who died during the year — 11.1 million — China has more older people than anywhere else in the world, a number that is rising rapidly. Total deaths last year rose 6.6%, with the death rate reaching the highest level since 1974 during the Cultural Revolution. China’s 2023 rate of 7.87 deaths per 1,000 people was higher than a rate of 7.37 deaths in 2022. China’s population aged 60 and over reached 296.9 million in 2023, about 21.1% of its population, up from 280 million in 2022.

China, long the most populated country in the world, dropped into second place behind India in 2023, according to UN estimates. Long-term, UN experts see China’s population shrinking by 109 million by 2050, more than triple the decline of their previous forecast in 2019. The shrinking and aging population worries Beijing because it is draining China of the working-age people it needs to power the economy. The demographic crisis, which arrived sooner than nearly anyone expected, is already straining weak and underfunded healthcare and pension systems.
China hastened the problem with its one-child policy, which helped to push the birthrate down over several decades. The rule also created generations of young only-child girls who were given an education and employment opportunities — a cohort that turned into empowered women who now view Beijing’s efforts as pushing them back into the home. Xi Jinping, China’s top leader, has long talked about the need for women to return to more traditional roles in the home. He recently urged government officials to promote a “marriage and childbearing culture,” and to influence what young people think about “love and marriage, fertility and family.”
But experts said the efforts lacked any attempt to address deep-seated gender inequality. “It seems that the government’s birth policy is only aimed at making babies but doesn’t protect the person who gives birth. It does not protect the rights and interests of women,” said Rashelle Chen, a social media professional from the southern province of Guangdong. Chen, 33, has been married for five years and said she didn’t intend to have a baby.

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