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CRN: Experts Criticize China’s Official Gini Coefficient

China Review News (CRN) recently reported on the Gini Coefficient that the National Bureau of Statistics released. It has been over a decade since the Bureau last released China’s Gini Coefficient. In this current new release, the Bureau published official numbers for the past ten years. All numbers were between 0.473 and 0.491. Immediately after the official announcement, many economists posted their comments online. Some called the official numbers “unbelievable” compared to unofficial numbers that are typically around 0.6. Some even described the official results as “braver than fairy tales.” The most conservative comments suggested that these numbers “still reflected a big income gap between the rich and the poor.” The Gini Coefficient is commonly used as a measure of the inequality in income or wealth. The global average Gini Coefficient is 0.44, and the Index number of 0.4 is a widely accepted international red line. All experts asked for the details on the methodology used for the official calculation.

[Editor’s Note: The Washington Post reported on December 11, 2012, for example, that a new study from Southwestern University of Finance and Economics found "that China’s Gini coefficient was, as of 2010, an alarmingly high 0.61."]

Source: China Review News, January 19, 2013
http://www.zhgpl.com/crn-webapp/doc/docDetailCreate.jsp?coluid=45&kindid=0&docid=102408573&mdate=0119153611

Survey Shows 40% of People Dare Not Go Out at Night

A recent government survey on 38 cities in China showed that 39.91 percent of people dare not go out at night and that 38.69 percent would worry about the safety of their personal property if they left home for a long period.

On December 20, 2012, the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences issued the Public Service Blue Book 2012. The Blue Book examined the causes of people’s lack of a sense of security. “The intense changes in social structure will result in increased uncertainty and risks. Deep adjustments in income redistribution could lead to polarization, conflicts of interest, and social psychological imbalances. Some people in the low-income population, with hostility toward the unequal distribution, might wantonly release that hostility, thus leading to increases in public security related incidents.”

Source: Beijing New, December 21, 2012
http://www.bjnews.com.cn/news/2012/12/21/240484.html

RFA: Rights Lawyer Prohibited from Giving Media Interview

Radio Free Asia (RFA) reported that, in August of 2012, Wang Chen, a rights lawyer from Hang Zhou, Zhejiang Province, initiated a petition campaign calling for an end to the labor camp system. Recently, Wang mailed the petition, which had over 10,000 signatures, to the People’s Congress and the State Council. Wang told RFA on Monday, December 3 that, when he was about to leave for an interview with a Hong Kong media on November 30, the police blocked him from leaving his house. They later summoned him to the police station for “Inciting subversion of state power.” Wang told RFA that the signatures he collected came from people from all walks of life, including lawyers, business owners, farm workers, public servants, people who had been locked up in labor camps, and some famous public figures, including Ai Weiwei, Jiang Tianyong, Li Heping, Li Fangping, Xu Zhiyong and Ten Biao.

Source: Radio Free Asia, December 3, 2012
http://www.rfa.org/mandarin/yataibaodao/ql1-12032012094501.html

Yangtze Evening News: 27% of Wealthy Company Owners Have Completed Emigration

Yangtze Evening News recently reported that 27 percent of Chinese company owners having over RMB 100 million yuan (around US$16 million) worth of private property have completed the processes of emigrating  to foreign countries. The statistics are based on a research report jointly issued by the Merchants Bank and Bain Consulting. Forty-seven percent of the same sample are considering the emigration option. The main reasons given for the decision to emigrate are the children’s education, retirement planning, and risk management for their wealth. The report expressed the concern that this new wave of emigration is coupled with a massive outflow of capital from China to the outside world, which may damage the effort to expand China’s domestic consumer market.

Source: Yangtze Evening News, November 30, 2012
http://epaper.yzwb.net/html_t/2012-11/30/content_41296.htm?div=-1

Beijing Court Sentenced Local Government Detention Guards for Illegal Detention

For the first time, a Beijing Chaoyang District court issued a decision on guards who detained petitioners illegally. It sentenced 10 local government detention guards to prison terms on charges of illegal detention.

Last May, the Beijing police arrested 10 persons at a location where the Liaison Office of Henan Province had detained 12 petitioners from Henan because they had came to Beijing to appeal their grievances to the central government. On September 24, 3012, a court in the Beijing Chaoyang District held its first hearing. The second hearing was held on November 27, 2012, where the three juvenile suspects were tried. The court met for the third time on November 28, 2012, for the trial of the seven adults. The court issued its decision that same day. It sentenced the lead suspect to prison for a term of one and a half years and the remaining nine to prison for terms of different lengths, all on charges of illegal detention.  

Source: 64tianwang.com, November 28, 2012
http://www.64tianwang.com/bencandy.php?fid-16-id-11767-page-1.htm

Man from Shanghai Sues Ministry of Finance for Job Discrimination

Beijing Times reported that Tian Hua from Shanghai, who had the top score in the 2012 National Civil Service Exam, was denied a job with the Ministry of Finance. In April 2012, Tian filed an administrative legal action claiming discrimination. In November 2012, the Beijing No. 1 Intermediate People’s Court dismissed the legal action citing lack of jurisdiction. On November 27, Tian filed an appeal with the Beijing Higher People’s Court.

The Shanghai resident, who used the pseudonym Tian Hua, has a masters degree and is a certified accountant. He ranked No. 1 in both the written and the oral exams. Nevertheless, the Ministry of Finance rejected him on the grounds that he failed the physical exam. Tian had disclosed to the examining physician that he had hand muscle atrophy 11 years ago and has since been cured. “After a ‘communication’ between the Ministry of Finance and the hospital, the hospital produced a document stating that Tian is not physically fit for the job due to ‘other diseases that affect his ability to adequately perform official duties.’”

Source: Beijing Times, November 28, 2012
http://beijing.jinghua.cn/c/201211/28/n3813588.shtml

China’s Third Mass Emigration: The Wealthy Are Leaving China

On November 27, 2012, BWChinese.com published an article providing detailed information about  China’s Third Wave of Mass Emigration. The first emigration wave, in the early 1980s, was the wave for studying overseas for higher degrees. The second wave, in the 1990s, was the emigration of professionals. In recent years, most emigrants have been the newly rich Chinese, who use investments to migrate to other countries. Some of them are entrepreneurs whose purpose is to protect their wealth. Others are CCP officials who escaped from China with huge amounts of public funds. In addition, the family members of many business owners and CCP officials live overseas. According to a report released by the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, at the present time, “about 45 million Chinese live in different countries around the world.”

The article stated, “When those with money leave, they can only take their wealth with them. However, the damage when officials emigrate is much greater. They not only take away their wealth, but also rob and poison this country.”

Source: BWChinese.com, November 27, 2012
http://www.bwchinese.com/article/1035747.html

Xinhua: Someone Else Ate the Students’ Nutritious Lunches

Xinhua recently reported on a widely spreading story about the corruption scandal related to some village elementary school students’ "nutritious" lunches. The story first broke on China’s twitter-like microblogging sites, where college volunteers posted messages online exposing the fact that many elementary school students are receiving problematic government-funded “nutritious lunch” packages. There lunches are only worth about RMB 3 yuan (around $0.51). One package contained one small piece of bread and one small carton of cold milk. Its actual cost was widely estimated to be below RMB 1 yuan (around $0.17). Similar problems occurred in many provinces. Remembering such incidents as expired milk, Chinese public opinion quickly turned into an active discussion of widespread corruption. Even the government controlled media are questioning the bidding process for those who supply lunches and are calling for a full scale investigation.
Sources: 
Xinhua, November 26, 2012
http://news.xinhuanet.com/comments/2012-11/26/c_113798179.htm
People’s Daily, November 26, 2012
http://edu.people.com.cn/n/2012/1126/c1053-19694237.html