To be or not to be, that’s a question.
Mr. Lin, whose hometown is Quanzhou, Fujian, and currently works in Xiamen, has given birth to two daughters and plans to have another one. However, because his wife works in a public institution, she can only choose to wait and see at present.
For the white-collar groups in many big cities, due to the late age of marriage and childbirth and the pressure of economic life, even if the birth policy is liberalized, the willingness to have children is not high.
"I graduated with a master’s degree at the age of 25 and gave birth to my first baby at the age of 34. I may have another baby before the age of 40, or I may not give birth." Ms. Li, who works in Guangzhou, said.
On April 14th, the People’s Bank of China released the No.2 paper in 2021, "Understanding and Countermeasures for China’s Population Transition", which set off a public opinion field.
According to the working paper, the population situation in China has been reversed, and the gray rhinoceros is getting closer and closer; We should realize that the population situation in China has been reversed, and the rate of population decline after the transition will be beyond imagination, and it is difficult for education and scientific and technological progress to make up for the population decline. The article holds that it is necessary to fully liberalize and vigorously encourage childbearing, effectively solve women’s difficulties in pregnancy, childbirth, nursery and school, and let women dare to have children, be able to have children and want to have children.
On April 15, A-share milk powder stocks and maternal and child stocks immediately responded with a big rise, and many stocks such as Beinmei opened at the daily limit. People in the industry believe that the number of newly born people in China has declined for three consecutive years, which has brought about a shrinking market aggregate and intensified competition in the industry. Behind the surge, the industry has suffered from this situation for a long time.
The declining trend of China’s birth population in recent years makes the topic of "whether fertility should be fully liberalized" constantly stir the nerves of public opinion, and also influences the trend of the capital market.
It is worth noting that after ten years, the latest data of the seventh national census will be released soon.
The population problem has a far-reaching impact. Researchers from the People’s Bank of China are also paying close attention to this topic. Cai Fang, a well-known population economist in China, recently became a member of the central bank’s monetary policy committee with the consent of the State Council. He recently talked about China’s consumption potential, population, aging and other issues on many occasions.
The effect of the two-child policy weakened.
China is a populous country. Subtle changes in population policy are enough to cause a series of chain reactions in the economy and society.
On February 18th this year, official website, National Health Commission, in reply to the Proposal on Solving the Problem of Population Decline in Northeast China put forward by NPC deputies, mentioned that Northeast China can explore based on local conditions, study the impact of fully liberalizing birth restrictions on local economic and social aspects, and put forward a pilot scheme for implementing a comprehensive birth policy in Northeast China.
This reply was also interpreted by the market as "the Northeast is about to pilot the release of fertility". On February 19, domestic milk powder stocks and maternal and child-related stocks also staged a round of big gains. However, on February 21st, the Health and Health Commission responded and denied this market rumor.
Luo Zhi, director of the Department of Economics of Wuhan University, believes that the problem now is that the ultra-high income group and the low income group in society have much higher fertility wishes than the middle income group. After the birth is released, it is likely that the rich will struggle to live, and the low income group will respond positively because of the low investment and low cost in raising children. On the contrary, a large number of middle-income families have low fertility intentions because of many factors such as time cost and education investment.
Professor Dong Yuzheng, president of Guangdong Population Development Research Institute, told CBN that an important objective reason for the decrease in the birth population is the decrease in women of childbearing age. As the number of women of childbearing age has decreased significantly, the number of qualified and able mothers has decreased, so the number of births will inevitably decrease, which is an important objective factor. "At present, the effect of the universal two-child policy is not a weakening problem, but quite weak."
"It is impossible to achieve this goal just by liberalizing the birth policy. It is also necessary to reduce or exempt the middle class with more children, and at the same time increase the supply of public kindergartens, primary schools and junior high schools. Education reform and old-age care also need to be matched." Luo Zhi told CBN that the labor participation rate of women in China is very high, and it is necessary to fully consider the influence of childbearing on women’s career development and income in the reform of fertility policy, and strengthen the design of incentive mechanism for women’s childbearing in the whole society.
Yang Yifan, vice president of the International Institute of Aging Science of Southwest Jiaotong University, told CBN that the current problems of declining savings rate and sluggish consumption in China are indeed related to changes in the demographic structure. The financial sector should not only call for the liberalization of childbearing, but also pay attention to its own "aging-friendly" business innovation, carry out structural reform of financial supply products, expand financial services and supply for the elderly, provide more financial products for the elderly, and work together with other departments to cope with aging.
The number of people born in many places will decline in 2020.
At present, many places have released data on the population born in 2020. From the data released by various places, the decline is obvious.
For example, in Shenyang, the only mega-city in Northeast China, the recently released Statistical Bulletin of Shenyang in 2020 shows that the registered population of the whole city was 7.622 million at the end of 2020. The birth rate is 6.68‰ , down 1.67 thousandths from the previous year, and the sex ratio of the birth population was 107.1; The population mortality rate is 10.02‰ , increased by 1.71 thousandths. Natural population growth rate -3.34‰ , reduced by 3.38 thousandths.
Due to the low birth rate, the natural growth rate of population in a big city like Shenyang has reached -3.34%. However, with the relaxation of the threshold for settlement, many ordinary cities in the province have moved in, so the registered population has increased by 58,000. However, on the whole, the young population of ordinary prefecture-level cities in Liaoning and even Northeast China continues to lose.
In Ningbo, Zhejiang Province, according to the statistical bulletin of Ningbo in 2020, 43,521 people were born in the whole city, and the birth rate was 7.12‰ . The population born in the previous year was 49,464, and the birth rate was 8.17‰ . In other words, in 2020, the number of people born in Ningbo decreased by 5,943 compared with the previous year, down by 12%.
According to the statistics of the first financial reporter, at present, some cities that have published the data of the population born in 2020 have dropped by between one and two percent.
The decline in the birth population is subject to many factors. For example, in 2020, due to the epidemic situation, fertility will also be affected; After five years, the two-child effect has gradually weakened, and the proportion of women of childbearing age has decreased; The decrease in the number of people getting married, the delay in the age of marriage and childbearing, and the decline in the willingness to have children.
Judging from the national birth population data over the years, the birth population in 2019 was 14.65 million, which was only about 58% of the peak year of birth in 1987. In the next few years, with the people born between 1998 and 2003 gradually entering the stage of marriage and childbearing, the birth population will inevitably continue to decline. Under the influence of various factors, in a few years, the annual birth population in China will probably fall to less than 10 million, which is less than half of the average annual birth population in the 1980s and 1990s.
The market is waiting for the wind.
In view of the continuous decline of the birth population, the above-mentioned working paper pointed out that it is necessary to fully liberalize and vigorously encourage fertility. The birth rate depends on the proportion of women of childbearing age and the birth rate. The former is influenced by the historical population situation and it is difficult to change. The latter is influenced by the current women’s understanding, and the improvement is relatively quick.
The article suggests that, on the one hand, fertility (triplets and above) should be fully liberalized. "Don’t hesitate to wait and see the effects of existing policies. It is useless to take advantage of the fact that some residents want to live and don’t let go when they are alive. When everyone doesn’t want to let go, it will be useless."
"We should seize the opportunity that the current birth policy is still a hard constraint on some residents, fully liberalize birth and release their high fertility will in time. If we hesitate a little, we will miss the precious window period of coping with population transformation with birth policy and repeat the mistakes of developed countries." The article pointed out.
At present, for different groups, the release of triplets and even the full release of fertility has great differences. Some groups have the will to have three or more children.
Economic pressure, high cost of child-rearing and high housing prices are important factors affecting fertility willingness. At the end of last year, an analysis of Zhejiang population structure and its changing trend jointly issued by Zhejiang Provincial Bureau of Statistics and Zhejiang Provincial Development and Reform Commission pointed out that (at present) the cost of childbirth is huge. According to the national fertility will survey, the economic burden ranks first among the top ten reasons why women of childbearing age do not intend to give birth again. Almost all the respondents think that preschool education expenditure is a heavy burden for them. For dual-employee families, child care and family services rely heavily on family intergenerational support.
The central bank issued two working papers in succession this year, both involving population issues.
In addition to the above working papers, on March 25th, 2021, the Central Bank’s No.1 paper "Research on the Calculation of China’s Potential Output and Growth Motivation during the Tenth Five-Year Plan" also pointed out that in the future, with the continuous decline of China’s demographic dividend, the contribution of labor force to economic growth will further decline, but the contribution rate of labor force quality to economic growth will increase; It is necessary to strengthen the support of structural monetary policy for industries with high human capital quality and high total factor productivity.
Although the central bank’s working papers all stated that they did not represent the People’s Bank of China, Song Liang, an independent dairy analyst, told the First Financial Reporter that the attitude of encouraging childbearing in the (latest) central bank’s papers was very clear, and I believe that there will be new progress in the near future.
In the industry’s view, the shrinking of the total market due to the decrease of the birth population is a common problem faced by the domestic milk powder industry and the maternal and child industry.
Since 2017, the number of newly born people in China has dropped three times, from 17.23 million in 2017 to 14.65 million in 2019, which also has a direct impact on the total market capacity of the domestic maternal and child industry. Industry growth has entered the era of stock competition, and competition among enterprises has intensified. If fertility can be liberalized, it will undoubtedly be good for related industries.
However, Song Liang said that the current decline in fertility is not only caused by the decrease of women of childbearing age, but also a complex social problem, so the policy of supporting fertility should be considered more comprehensively.
Ren Zeping, chief economist of soochow securities, issued a document on 15th, saying that not only will triplets be released in the future, but quadruplets and quintuplets may be rewarded in the future. The birth policy may be adjusted during the 14 th Five-Year Plan period. It is best to fully liberalize fertility, but it is really impossible to liberalize the third child first, speed up the construction of fertility support system, such as the guarantee of women’s employment, increase nursery services, increase public expenditure on education, medical care and social security, and establish an elderly-friendly city society.
"China’s fertility level has been transformed to be determined by endogenous variables, pointing to the stable low fertility level and the trend of declining birthrate. Gone are the days when the exogenous variable of fertility policy was used to determine the fertility trend. By the middle of this century or even longer, the basic form of declining birthrate at the micro-family level will not be fundamentally changed. The logical starting point for dealing with the dilemma of declining birthrate should be to face the objective reality and seek a solution to the problem from reality. " Yuan Xin, a professor at the Institute of Population and Development, School of Economics, Nankai University, told CBN.
