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Li Keqiang on the Bottom Line of No Large-Scale Unemployment

On May 13, 2019, Chinese Premier Li Keqiang chaired and spoke at a recent national conference on entrepreneurship and jobs where he demanded that cadres at all levels make job creation their top priority.

Li said that, “the situation is complicated and grim” in the job market and that priority should be given to fresh graduates, demobilized military personnel and migrant workers.

To address this “complicated and grim situation,” Li said it’s the responsibility of regional governments, for they “must not break the bottom line of no large-scale unemployment.”

For migrant workers, Li asked regional authorities to take charge of their own unemployment issues. For provinces where large numbers of migrant workers tend to come to work, Li said that local authorities must do all they can to keep unemployed people in their region and to prevent migrant workers from returning to their hometowns en masse.

Meanwhile, Li said, authorities in provinces where most people leave to find work elsewhere, usually poor provinces where residents leave for work in the big cities, must assist those who have returned to their hometowns in securing jobs or starting their own businesses locally,

Source: Xinhua, May 13, 2019
http://www.xinhuanet.com/politics/leaders/2019-05/13/c_1124488813.htm

Briefings | | |   Economy/Resources

In 2017 China’s Resident Debt Burden Exceeded 53 Percent of GDP

According to Chinese media, in the first half of 2017, mainland China’s resident debt burden exceeded 53 percent of China’s GDP. This figure includes residential mortgages and loans from Peer to peer (P2P) lending.

Without residential mortgages and P2P lending, the resident debt was 3 percent of GDP in 1996, 18 percent in 2008 and it hit 47.5 percent in 2017. From 2008 to 2017, it increased by 30 percentage points. It is noteworthy that it took the United States 60 years to increase from 20 percent to 50 percent while China took fewer than 10 years.

Further, based on data from banks, the debt-to-income ratio is much higher than 78.1 percent. From 2006 to 2017, the debt-to-disposable income ratio for mainland China’s residents surged from 18.3 percent to 78.1 percent. If other types of borrowing were included, the figure would be even more alarming. That is to say, it is much higher than 78.1 percent.

Source: Sohu, May 12, 2019
http://www.sohu.com/a/313385609_100202672?sec=wd

Briefings | | |   Economy/Resources

Beijing City: New Grain and Oil Price Control Has Nothing To Do With U.S.-China Trade Friction  

On May 13, 2019, the official Beijing Municipal Development and Reform Commission (BMDRC) website released the “Beijing Grain and Oil Market Supply and Price Volatility Emergency Control Plan.”

On May 14, 2019, China Business News reported that the BMDRC stated that the grain and oil fluctuation emergency plan announced on May 13, 2019 has nothing to do with U.S.-China trade friction.

The Control Plan “is a work that has been promoted before and it is part of the long-term price control. The time of the release just happens to be at this time. [The Control Plan] has nothing to do with Sino-US trade friction,” said the person in charge at the BMDRC

The BMDRC stated that the price of grain can affect the price of hundreds of items. Food security is an important foundation for national security. Food prices such as grain can play a critical role in balancing the entire price level. China’s edible oil market is highly dependent on foreign countries.  Domestic and international market prices are closely linked. It is equally important to stabilize the supplies in the edible oil market and to [secure] price stability.

The Control Plan sets three warnings: green, yellow (year-on-year price increase of 5 to10 percent for grain and 10 to 20 percent for edible oil) and red (year-on-year price increase of over 10 percent for grain and over 20 percent for edible oil). The three warning area indicators trigger three levels of government intervention respectively. The intervention may be through organized sourcing, increasing supply, speeding up distribution, cracking down on illegal activities such as hoarding and raising prices, price emergency measures, temporary price interventions, subsidies, and other emergency assistance.

Source: China Business News, May 14, 2019
http://www.cb.com.cn/index/show/zj_m/cv/cv13448901260

 

Briefings | | |   Economy/Resources

Internet Censorship Is a Booming Industry in China. Of Course, the Article about Censorship Was Quickly Censored

On April 19, 2019, Southern Weekend, a Chinese media headquartered in Guangzhou of Guangdong Province, published a feature article about how Internet censorship has become a booming industry in China.  The article itself was quickly censored.

The article titled, “Jinan: The Rising Internet Audit Capital,” reported that Jinan, the capital of Shandong Province, is becoming the second largest operation area for Beijing ByteDance Technology Co. Ltd., an Internet company known for its content auditing business. It takes on the censorship work of other companies.  Up to 3,600 personnel have been hired to trawl the Internet and remove content that the Communist government prohibits.

In the Internet content audit industry, Jinan and Tianjin are the bases in the north; Xi’an is the base in the northwest; Chongqing and Chengdu are responsible for the southwest; and Wuhan handles the central China region.

According to a person close to the Jinan municipal government department, the expansion of the content auditing operation has received the support of the Propaganda Department and the Cyberspace Administration of the Jinan Municipal Communist Party Committee.

Source: Epoch Times, April 20, 2019
http://www.epochtimes.com/gb/19/4/19/n11199613.htm

Briefings | | |   Information/Technology

China’s Ministry of Justice: Lawyers Must Support the Communist Party

On March 27, 2019, China’s Ministry of Justice announced that, by the end of August 2019, it will implement a professional evaluation system and assessment mechanism for lawyers throughout the country in furtherance of the reform in managing lawyers. The review criteria include the political performance of lawyers. In other words, it assesses whether they support the leadership of the Communist Party.

The professional evaluation system and assessment mechanism first began in March 2017 as a pilot program in Inner Mongolia, Shanghai, Anhui Province, and Shaanxi Province. The Ministry of Justice said that the rating process is conducive to distinguishing good lawyers from bad ones.

According to the website of China’s Ministry of Justice, four criteria must be met: political performance, integrity, years of practice, and the ability to practice.

The focus will be on the first two criteria. The first criterion “political performance” requires that lawyers participating in the rating process must support the leadership of the Communist Party and the socialist rule of law. Under the second criterion “integrity,” if the Communist Party disciplined a lawyer or if he received administrative punishment within the past five years, he will not be eligible to participate in the rating process. Big data will be used to gather information about lawyers’ political performance and integrity.

Source: China’s Ministry of Justice, March 27, 2019
http://www.chinalaw.gov.cn/government_public/content/2019-03/27/tzwj_231623.html

Briefings | | |   Government/Politics

Chinese City Guangzhou Offers Rewards for Tip-offs on Religion Crackdown

On March 20, 2019, the Department of Ethnic and Religious Affairs of Guangzhou, a city of 14 million people, which is adjacent to Hong Kong, announced that members of the public could earn up to 10,000 yuan (US$1,500) for providing tip-offs about “illegal religious activities.”

The announcement prohibits anyone from using “religions to carry out activities that undermine the social order, harm the health of citizens, or impede the State’s educational system.”

According to the announcement, the “illegal religious activities” that were targeted include the construction of temples and statues of Buddha, organizing pilgrimages, private Christian gatherings, spreading religion on the Internet, religious training, and the printing of religious publications that the authorities did not approve.

The department’s website said the new reward scheme also has the purpose of “resisting penetration” by foreign countries that use religion to Westernize or divide the Chinese people. “At present, the use of religion for infiltration activities abroad is pervasive and this trend is increasing.”

Further, according to the announcement, “at present, hostile forces and lawless elements carry our many illegal and criminal activities under the banner of religion. These activities undermine the unity of the country and national unity, violate the rights of citizens, and seriously endanger society.”

Sources:
Department of Ethnic and Religious Affairs of Guangzhou, March 20, 2019
http://www.gzmzzj.gov.cn/mzzjswj/gfxwj/201903/353dee928bb14ee1a76a86c07845c14e.shtml
http://www.gzmzzj.gov.cn/mzzjswj/zcjd/201903/8a55bc87d88b40e7892770575a0f927f.shtml

Briefings | | |   Government/Politics

Sina Military: To Curb China, U.S. Resorts to Its Old Way against the Soviet Union

On March 29, 2019, Sina’s military channel reported, citing Lianhe Zaobao, that “some former U.S. government officials and policy advisers revived a committee that had been established during the Cold War in Washington to deal with the so-called ‘threat from China.’” Lianhe Zaobao is a Singapore-based Chinese-language newspaper.

According to Sina, Brian Kennedy, the chairman of the Committee on the Present Danger: China, played up his remarks at a press conference held on the 25th that the committee was established to help the United States recognize various conventional and unconventional threats and think about how to resist. He also claimed that the committee is completely independent and bipartisan. Citing Lianhe Zaobao, Sina stated that some U.S. conservatives established a similar committee during the Cold War targeting the Soviet Union.  Citing the Russian Независимая газета, Sina reported that the committee requested, during the Cold War, that the budget for the Pentagon be tripled. {Editor’s Note: The Free Beacon published a description in English}.

Sources:
1. Sina, March 29, 2019
https://mil.news.sina.com.cn/dgby/2019-03-29/doc-ihtxyzsm1527482.shtml
2. Free Beacon, March 26. 2019
https://freebeacon.com/national-security/national-security-group-reestablished-with-focus-on-china-threat/

Briefings | | |   US-China Relations

RFA: Communist Youth League Pushes a Social Credit System App for China’s Youth

Recently, the Communist Youth League Central Committee (CYLCC) launched a big-data credit app in partnership with the State-owned Tsinghua Unigroup. People with good scores can enjoy preferential treatment in education and employment. Analysts believe this is another attempt to control young people’s behavior.

The app is called Unictown. It is available for free download at the Apple Store. Each user of the app receives a credit score between 350 and 800. The user may be entitled to tuition discounts or preferential treatment in job hunting.

Citing the South China Morning Post, Radio Free Asia (RFA) reported that, unlike the three credit rating companies in the United States, Unictown gathers and analyses a huge amount of non-economic and non-financial data. Academic publications, inventions, and volunteer activities may increase the user’s rating, while cheating on exams and plagiarism may lower his rating.

Analysts believe that this is nothing but the digitalized version of the personnel files that the Chinese Government has on everyone in China which follow a citizen all of his life. Online postings critical of the Chinese Government will likely lead Unictown users to have lower credit scores.

Unictown is said to be one of the products in the China Youth Credit Management (CY Credit) system that CYLCC and Tsinghua Unigroup have established. CY Credit is expected to cover all Chinese between the ages of 18 and 45, estimated at around 460 million.

Source: Radio Free Asia, March 25, 2019
https://www.rfa.org/mandarin/yataibaodao/meiti/xql-03252019104215.html

Briefings | | |   Government/Politics