62 year old Guangzhou man is New York City's Sad Panda
China: Nine nations in one?
Midweek Music Preview: Free tickets to Au Revoir Simone, Gaslamp Killer
Electrolist: Berlin 8-bit retroblaster tonight
Interview: Rich Medina funks up the Shelter
- Many free to have more than one child
Less than 40 percent of the population is restricted by the family planning policy to having one child, a senior official with the National Population and Family Planning Commission said yesterday. While popularly referred to as the "one child policy", the rule actually restricts just 35.9 percent of the population to having one child, Yu Xuejun, a spokesman with the commission, said in a Webcast on the government's website - Blood collection to be video-taped
The Ministry of Health has ordered all blood plasma collection centers across the country to videotape plasma collections in a bid to stamp out the illegal blood trade. - Pimping teachers face probe over prostitution
Police in southwest China's Guizhou Province have begun investigating a case involving two teachers who allegedly forced their students into prostitution, Beijing News reported yesterday. Several victims have lost the ability to bear children, the report said. - Algae outbreak in Suzhou?
The algae seems to spreading all across China now, and seems to have hit our neighbouring city of Suzhou. Shanghai Daily's story though is mysteriously short and simple. - Cash for dead flies in Luoyang
Authorities in Luoyang City in central China's Henan Province have set a bounty on dead flies in a bid to clean up their image and promote public hygiene. - China's newest export: lawsuits
Not since exploding Ford Pintos in the 1970s has there been as incendiary a catalyst for recalls as China's recent spate of consumer product scares. Since March a cluster of incidents involving potentially deadly, defective, or contaminated products imported from China - pet food, toys, tires, toothpaste, cough syrup, shrimp - has awakened both that country and the United States to a latent crisis. - How Microsoft conquered China
Or is it the other way around? Fortune's David Kirkpatrick goes on the road to Beijing with Bill Gates, who threw his business model out the window. - China's hidden wealth? Color it gray
How is it that urban Chinese seem to have so much money to spend when official statistics show them to be poor? They earn "gray income", mostly legal but unreported sources of income such as tips. If the US$4.4 trillion in gray income were part of the official gross domestic product, it would change how people view China.
Image of algae in pond by Wandering in China.
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This "grey" economy in China is called "ski town" economy in the US. Locals get huge discounts and float each other big favors in return.
Let's say I am a waiter at a restaurant in a US ski town, an acquaintance who works at a ski shop walks in and orders food. I only ring this person up for a cheap appetizer despite the huge bill. I get a big tip in return (but the tip is still much smaller than the food bill), I grease the cooks a bit so they are on my wavelength. When I go looking for new ski gear, I also get a huge discount (in the 70% to 80% range) from the same person I hooked up a cheap meal with.
Likewise, just being a local in Shanghai, Beijing, Shenzhen, etc (I mean local, not chinese) can get you "discounts" at big chain health clubs, western restaurants, etc. All you do is reward your service person for the "assistance".
So there is no $4 trillion USD to add to China's GDP, that's just accounting propaganda (and everyone should know better than to trust anyone's books in China), foreign ventures are actually being bled considerably.
last post by nanheyangrouchuan