From: Paul Cockshott (wpc@DCS.GLA.AC.UK)
Date: Thu Jul 06 2006 - 16:33:07 EDT
This I believe is a factor of decisive significance for the balance of class forces internationally. Based on UN projections the section of the chinese population between the ages of 16-55 who are the most economically vigorous will peak sometime between 2010 and 2020. Since the latent reserve army in peasant agriculture is some way from being exhausted, the exploitable population will continue to rise for a short while after that. For how long it grows depends on the accumulation rate. An accumulation rate approaching 50% of GNP which is quite extraordinary can eat up population supplies fast. Rakesh says it is not yet critical but one should be wary of being too short term in ones perspective. For historical materialism it is the broad long term trends of a mode of production that are decisive. In this context the year 2006 is significant. It is the first year in which more than half the world population is urban. This puts the world as a whole at the same stage of capitalist development as Britain was when Engels and Marx arrived there and started and started their analysis of it with ' The condition of the working class in England'. By my reckoning the strategic shift in class forces brought on by demographic transition was evident here by 1900. From then on the tendancy was for the working class to grow in strength relative to the bourgoisie producing a series of restructuring crises. In China the process will be accelerated by several factors: 1. The rate of capital accumulation is an order of magnitude higher than it was in the 19th century. 2. The productivity differential between agriculture and industry is much higher, this is what temporarilly allows such a rapid rate of accumulation. 3. Whereas Britain could seize an empire that was much larger than its domestic population to offset the decline in the rate of profit, this is not possible for the most populous nation on the planet. This means that the inherent tendancies of capital accumulation] to self dissolve the capitalist mode of production will be more marked in China than they were in Europe a century ago. -----Original Message----- From: OPE-L on behalf of glevy@PRATT.EDU Sent: Sat 7/1/2006 2:48 PM To: OPE-L@SUS.CSUCHICO.EDU Subject: [OPE-L] China: Labor Power Shortage Looms I saw this on Globolist. With all of the talk of "over-population" in recent decades, this article raises some important issues. Given the age distribution of the population in certain regions in China, will it face a labor-power shortage? If so, how will that affect its terms of trade and manufacturing costs? How might it be overcome? (e.g. by internal [wrom where?] or external migration?) Will manufacturing shift to other regions in search of lower labor costs? Is the "boom" in Shanghai about to end? In solidarity, Jerry ============================================================ NY Times, June 30, 2006 As China Ages, a Shortage of Cheap Labor Looms By HOWARD W. FRENCH SHANGHAI, June 29 - Shanghai is rightfully known as a fast-moving, hypermodern city - full of youth and vigor. But that obscures a less well-known fact: Shanghai has the oldest population in China, and it is getting older in a hurry. Twenty percent of this city's people are at least 60, the common retirement age for men in China, and retirees are easily the fastest growing segment of the population, with 100,000 new seniors added to the rolls each year, according to a study by the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences. From 2010 to 2020, the number of people 60 or older is projected to grow by 170,000 a year. By 2020 about a third of Shanghai's population, currently 13.6 million, will consist of people over the age of 59, remaking the city's social fabric and placing huge new strains on its economy and finances. The changes go far beyond Shanghai, however. Experts say the rapidly graying city is leading one of the greatest demographic changes in history, one with profound implications for the entire country. The world's most populous nation, which has built its economic strength on seemingly endless supplies of cheap labor, China may soon face manpower shortages. An aging population also poses difficult political issues for the Communist government, which first encouraged a population explosion in the 1950's and then reversed course and introduced the so-called one-child policy a few years after the death of Mao in 1976. That measure has spared the country an estimated 390 million births but may ultimately prove to be another monumental demographic mistake. With China's breathtaking rise toward affluence, most people live longer and have fewer children, mirroring trends seen around the world. Those trends and the extraordinarily low birth rate have combined to create a stark imbalance between young and old. That threatens the nation's rickety pension system, which already runs large deficits even with the 4-to-1 ratio of workers to retirees that it was designed for. Demographers also expect strains on the household registration system, which restricts internal migration. The system prevents young workers from migrating to urban areas to relieve labor shortages, but officials fear that abolishing it could release a flood of humanity that would swamp the cities. As workers become scarcer and more expensive in the increasingly affluent cities along China's eastern seaboard, the country will face growing economic pressures to move out of assembly work and other labor-intensive manufacturing, which will be taken up by poorer economies in Asia and beyond, and into service and information-based industries. [...] India, the world's other emerging giant, also stands to benefit, with low wages and a far younger population than China. Even within China, Mr. Zuo said, many foreign investors have begun moving factories away from Shanghai and other eastern cities to inland locations, where the work force is cheaper and younger. Full: <http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/30/world/asia/30aging.html? hp&ex=1151726400&en=92530c7ed24b728e&ei=5094&partner=homepage>
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