Chapter 7 1. "Semi-developed countries" sector

In 2009, the whole country was talking about rising housing prices, but statistics from the National Bureau of Statistics showed that housing prices in medium-sized cities rose by 1.5%, which attracted numerous media and netizens' bombardments. "The figure of 1.5% is too far from what everyone actually feels." Even the former director of the Bureau of Statistics admitted this.Later, a statistic from the Ministry of Land and Resources came out. In 2009, China’s housing prices rose by 25.1%. This increase seems to be relatively reliable, but this statistic said that the average price of urban housing in China was 4,474 yuan per square meter.This average price seems to be unreliable.where is the problem?Naturally, there is room for improvement in statistical methods, but I think an important reason is that we count housing prices in cities and towns across the country. In 2009, housing prices rose mainly in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Hainan, and other places, and the increase in small and medium-sized cities was relatively small. .Since the statistics are the national average, the increases in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Hainan and other places have been flattened, making it difficult for people to find a feeling from the national average price.This also shows that the problems in China's developed regions have become more likely to affect China's overall problems, which is why the State Council has introduced one after another housing price control measures.

China has a large area, a large population, and complex conditions. It is often difficult to use national average statistics.This is very similar to a weather forecast. If you forecast the weather in Singapore, and you say that the average temperature in Singapore today is 32 degrees Celsius, everyone will believe it, because the farthest distance from east to west in Singapore is only 42 kilometers, and the furthest from south to north is only 23 kilometers. , the national area is 692.7 square kilometers, about one twenty-fifth of the area of ​​Beijing.But if you predict that the average temperature of the People's Republic of China is 32 degrees Celsius today, I am afraid that it is only statistically significant, and it is almost meaningless to residents living in different parts of China, because our country spans from temperate to tropical regions. The vast land has a variety of climate types.In the same season, the northern country is still freezing with ice and snow, while the southern country is already full of singing birds and fragrant flowers.From south to north, the temperature difference in winter in different parts of China can reach more than 40 degrees Celsius.

China is a super-large "civilized country" with a population larger than the sum of the United States, Canada, Europe, Australia, Japan, and Russia. This is the result of the "sum of a hundred countries" in its long history.Because of this, when we use "China's per capita GDP" to study China's national conditions, we will encounter the same embarrassment as using "China's average temperature" to study China's climate.To make weather forecasts in China, we must have the concept of regions and forecast different regions, otherwise it will be difficult for most Chinese people to find the feeling.Just like when discussing housing prices, one can plausibly say: Are housing prices in Chinese cities still expensive?Isn't it more than 4,000 yuan per square meter?Do you think he is right or wrong?The judgment of China's national conditions is also similar. China is a big country, and we need to have the concept of "plate concept" and "plate relationship concept" so that we can accurately grasp China's real national conditions and enable Chinese and foreigners to find a more accurate feeling .

In April 2009, a hot post "British college students in Shanghai" circulated on Sina and other websites.The article expresses the perception of ordinary British college students visiting China's developed sectors: More than 200 college students from 35 British universities stayed in Shanghai for two weeks to experience the daily life of Chinese people.As soon as they arrived at Pudong International Airport, they found that it was bigger, more beautiful and more modern than London Heathrow Airport.Compared with London Heathrow Airport, Pudong Airport is simply luxurious.When they arrived at Nanjing Road Pedestrian Street, they found that the size of the pedestrian street here is more than ten times that of the most prosperous London Oxford Street in the UK. They were shocked by the dazzling array of commodities and colorful fashions. According to the British textbooks, China is a country without electricity and buildings. broken country.

Some British students boarding with Chinese families are envious of the electrical facilities in Chinese homes, and some are surprised by the free TV broadcast of the Premier League in China; they saw that a TV set in a Chinese family can watch 120 channels, Because in the UK, most families can receive only 6-7 TV channels, and there is almost nothing to do at night. "This is probably the reason why the British like to go to bars." A student said humorously.Some students expressed a strong interest in karaoke; some students also expressed their "sincere admiration" for the Chinese people's daily diet.

In Pudong Century Park, at the construction site of Hongqiao Hub, at Xintiandi and Chenghuang Temple, and at the construction site of the World Expo, these British children have never seen the magnificent public buildings, towering and prosperous commercial buildings, and the vast and magnificent municipal construction scenes. .When boarding the World Finance and Trade Building and visiting the Shanghai Stock Exchange, the accompanying Chinese escorts saw their feet trembling, and the students were relatively silent.The cleanliness and speed of the Shanghai subway is almost a work of two eras compared with the long-term "trackwork" London subway; the rapid development of Shanghai's creative industry, the grand momentum of Zhangjiang Science City and the variety of modern communities are even more important in every bus gathering Sometimes, some college students are reluctant to move their feet, and always want to take a look and take a few more photos.Many times, at the dinner table, the Chinese escorts will hear the resonance of the young people blurting out that China is the real developed country.

I have visited all developed countries in the world except Iceland, and I have also been to the UK many times. I can understand the shock that British students have received. First, China’s developed regions are developing very fast, which can be described as changing with each passing day. The second is that Western media reports on China are often too one-sided, which has caused many prejudices and misunderstandings about China among ordinary people in the West.I remember one time when I was flying from Berlin to Beijing, sitting next to me were two old German women who traveled to China at their own expense. They kept asking me if I could exchange foreign currency at the Beijing airport and whether there were taxis at the airport. Whether the hotel is easy to find, but when the plane arrived at the new terminal of Beijing Capital Airport, the expressions on their faces can only be described as "shocked".I think they have never seen such a magnificent modern airport, and most Westerners have never seen it in their entire lives.In fact, the existing airports in Berlin are still quite backward, not even comparable to the airports in most provincial capitals in China.Berlin has spent 3.4 billion US dollars to build a new airport. The construction began 14 years ago, but it has not yet been completed. Various perennial lawsuits and government budget deficits have affected the progress of the project.To be fair, through 30 years of reform and opening up, the gap between China and developed countries has rapidly narrowed in many places.For a long time, Western countries have been very self-styled, always thinking that they represent the best level in the world, and history will end when they reach the level of the West.In fact, a rising China is not only catching up with the West, but also redefining the meaning of modernization in the process of catching up.

Almost all large and medium-sized cities in China are undergoing a complete transformation. The enthusiasm and momentum of the Chinese people to embrace the cause of modernization is something that most Westerners have never seen before, and it is also unprecedented in human history.Skyscrapers, expressways, high-speed railways, super commercial buildings, urban subways, electric vehicles, etc. used to be the patents of the West, but today the West suddenly finds that China is almost fully ahead in all these fields, and the Chinese often do it faster, More, better, newer, more stylish, lower carbon.No wonder when the news reported that the high-speed train from Wuhan to Guangzhou opened on December 26, 2009, the British "Daily Mail" quickly reported it with a super long headline with 17 English words and 5 huge photos. Marvel at how the world's fastest high-speed train took only 4 years to build.After the article was published, British netizens quickly followed up to express their "unbelievable" feelings.A netizen said: "Please invite Chinese engineers to Edinburgh, Scotland. A 12-mile railway with a maximum speed of only 70 kilometers per hour has been dragged for three years and will not be completed until 2011." Another netizen from the United States Says: "Contrast to our ground zero in New York, eight years later and still a big pit." Another said: "Look at our engineering project in Boston, budget overrun due to greedy union vampires 350%, and it will have to be delayed for more than 20 years to complete.” Another netizen wrote: “Look, what will happen if a country concentrates on its work? China, well done.”

Of course, looking at bright cities is not enough.Our urban-rural gap is still very large, and there are also problems of unbalanced development within cities. Our urban-rural gap is larger than that of all developed countries.It will be a long-term challenge to solve the gap between urban and rural areas in a super-large country with a population of 1.3 billion on a land of 9.6 million square kilometers.But think about it from another angle, isn't this where China's potential and opportunities lie?According to statistics from the United Nations, China has been the fastest urbanizing country in the world over the past three decades.I estimate that in the next 30 years, the country with the fastest urbanization process in the world will still be China, and the continuous narrowing of China's urban-rural gap means that in the next 30 years, China will also be the country with the most development opportunities in the world.

China's urban-rural differences are great, but from a global perspective, most of my country's rural areas have also undergone tremendous changes in the past three decades, but the scale is not as large as that of cities.Dissatisfied with the gap between urban and rural areas in China, some of us say that China's "cities are like Europe, and the countryside is like Africa".Europe is far from the vitality displayed by China's developed sector. Many places, such as Marseille in France, Rome, Naples, Genoa in Italy and other cities, feel sluggish and have seriously aging infrastructure, which has obviously lagged behind China's first-line Most cities in Africa have not reached the average level of rural China: the average life expectancy in Africa is only about 50 years old, while the average life expectancy in rural China is about 70 years old.Color TVs have become popular in rural China, and most people live in brick houses or even high-rise buildings, while more than half of the people in African cities live in slums without electricity supply, and most rural residents live in thatched houses, often without windows. nothing.According to the latest statistics from the United Nations, in sub-Saharan Africa, 89% of the rural population has no access to electricity, which means that 9 out of 10 people in rural areas do not have access to electricity.An average of 41% of the rural population in developing countries does not have access to electricity, and our relatively backward Tibet Autonomous Region has an electricity coverage rate of more than 70%, surpassing the overall level of India.I noticed from the TV screen that the apartment buildings in Zhouqu, Gansu Province, which were washed away by mudslides, were all equipped with air conditioners, which obviously exceeded the level in Mumbai, India.The construction of roads connecting our villages is almost complete, which is unimaginable in most developing countries.Looking at rural China, we must also consider the potential value of rural land in China.For example, in the Chongqing rural land transfer experiment started not long ago, homesteads in the outer suburbs of Chongqing were put up for auction, and one mu of land was auctioned for 100,000 yuan, while the rural land prices in China's developed sectors have long been countless times this value.I think that with the deepening of the reform of China's rural land system, the proper revitalization of rural land assets can create huge wealth for the majority of farmers and bring a lot of funds for the construction of new countryside.The socialist land system with Chinese characteristics has laid the foundation for realizing this prospect.This is also impossible for developing countries adopting the western land system.Of course, there is still a long way to go to truly build China's rural areas to the level of today's rural areas in developed countries, and it will probably not be possible until China's urbanization process is basically completed.

China has a large population and a vast territory, which is a huge challenge for understanding China.I personally think that in order to avoid the embarrassment of "China's average temperature", we need to read China carefully. At least we can divide China into two major parts to understand and grasp (if necessary, it can be subdivided). In addition to seeing two The characteristics of each plate, but also the relationship between the two plates, so that we can more accurately grasp today's China, and give a more convincing explanation to the Chinese people and the world.In my opinion, there are two major plates in China, one is the "quasi-developed" plate (or "developed plate"), and the other is the "emerging economies" plate (or "emerging plate"). A highly complementary benign interaction has been achieved, which is also the main reason for China's rapid rise and will continue to promote the continuous development of China's modernization.Of course, I am only proposing a concept here, and the detailed demonstration needs the participation of more social scientists to complete. The "quasi-developed countries" section of China I am talking about includes the entire developed coastal areas, especially the Yangtze River Delta metropolitan area, the Pearl River Delta metropolitan area, the Beijing-Tianjin-Tangzhou metropolitan area, the urban agglomerations of the Liaodong Peninsula and the Jiaodong Peninsula, and some inland cities.The population of this plate is estimated to be at least 300 million.This sector has become a leader in China's economic and social development.The reason why I call this sector the "quasi-developed" sector is because it has already possessed the main characteristics of a developed economy, such as the average life expectancy of 75-80 years; the average life expectancy of Beijing and Shanghai is higher than that of New York; The level of facilities is higher than the average level of developed countries; the prosperity of business and the convenience of life are also higher than the average level of developed countries; the per capita GDP, according to purchasing power parity, has reached about 15,000 to 25,000 US dollars; the per capita education level has also reached developed countries The country’s average level; the overall technological strength is stronger than that of developed countries; the housing ownership rate exceeds that of developed countries, and the average area and quality of residents’ housing exceed the levels of Japan and Hong Kong, China (this is one of the meanings that China’s GDP surpasses Japan) ; If you observe it on the spot, you can feel that the overall level of cities in this plate is not lower than that of southern European developed countries, such as Greece, Portugal, and most towns in Italy.The overall level of big cities in this plate exceeds that of many metropolises in developed countries, such as Rome, Athens, Lisbon, Marseille, Genoa, Naples and so on.The reason why I have reserved the word "quasi" is because some aspects of this sector have not yet reached the average level of developed countries, such as environmental indicators and the cultural quality of citizens.So we still have to be modest and prudent, work hard, learn all the strengths of others, and strive to catch up from behind. According to Angus Maddison's calculation in March 2009, the economic gap between China and the United States has narrowed from 4.4 times in 1978 to 1.17 times in 2006.Considering that the difference between urban and rural areas in China is greater than that in the United States, the gap between urban agglomerations in developed regions in China and New York in the United States should be much smaller than 1.17 times.So today, when many Chinese arrive in New York from China's first-tier cities, they do have the feeling of "who is the third world" that Friedman described earlier.I felt the same way when I went to New York myself.As for the conclusion that New York’s per capita GDP is 5 times higher than that of Beijing and Shanghai, I think that apart from problems with the statistical method, it is also far from the experience of most people in field visits. I respect this conclusion at a distance. The "Report on the Development of China's Provincial Economic Comprehensive Competitiveness (2008-2009)" released by the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences on February 28, 2010 can also roughly confirm the strength of China's "quasi-developed" sector: Guangdong, Jiangsu, Shandong and Zhejiang provinces China's GDP has surpassed that of some G20 countries. In 2008, the total economic volume of Guangdong Province surpassed that of Saudi Arabia, Argentina and South Africa, ranking 16th among G20 countries.Shanghai and Beijing are already in the post-industrialization stage, Tianjin and Guangdong are in the second half of the late industrialization stage, and Zhejiang, Jiangsu, and Shandong are in the first half of the late industrialization stage.From the perspective of per capita GDP, the three municipalities of Shanghai, Beijing and Tianjin have also surpassed some G20 countries, among which Shanghai can be ranked 12th.The economic scale of the Yangtze River Delta also exceeds that of South Korea and India, and these evaluations use official exchange rates. If it is calculated by purchasing power parity, this ranking will improve a lot.