China’s population is disappearing
It could bring down the Communist Party
And the global economy
Welcome to China Uncensored, I’m Chris Chappell.
China is on the cusp of disaster.
I realize I need to narrow that down a bit.
China’s disasters are like Baskin Robbins. So many flavors to choose from.
I’m not talking about China’s massive real estate Ponzi scheme.
Or the latest Covid surge that’s affecting most of the population.
Or even the fact that China is running out of water.
No, I’m talking about the fact that China is running out of people.
And it’s not just because the police disappear so many dissidents.
For the first time in 60 years, more people are dying in China than being born.
New data from China’s National Bureau of Statistics reveals that last year,
nine and half million people were born, but almost ten and half million people died.
That means China’s population has shrunk by about 850,000 people in a single year.
I haven’t seen something shrink that much since Limp Bizkit’s popularity after 2002.
The last time there was a population decline in China was during Mao’s Great Leap Forward
in the 50’s and 60’s. It caused a massive famine that killed an estimated 30 to 40 million people.
What is it with communist policies and famine? Communism is like open
relationships. You might think it sounds great on paper. But it always ends in disaster.
Anyway, the United Nations predicts that at some point this year,
China will no longer be the most populous country on Earth. India will replace China.
Now this has been coming for a long time.
“Chinese officials last year conceded that the country was
on the verge of a population decline that would likely begin before 2025.”
It just happened earlier than expected.
It’s almost like all those years of the Communist Party forcing women
to have abortions and sterilizing them are coming back to bite it.
Who would have thought that shooting yourself in the foot
would hurt your chances at winning a marathon?
That being said, the Communist Party has been
desperately trying to stave off this population decline.
In 2016, the Party said it would end the one Child policy and allow people to have *two* kids! Wow,
what liberal reform! Of course their work units would still monitor women’s menstrual
cycles if necessary—which is an actual policy that’s been going on for decades.
But even after the policy change...Chinese people
didn’t really want to have more kids. A lot of them kind of wanted no kids.
If you want to know why so many people in China don’t want to bring a child
into this world, this channel has 10 years worth of videos explaining why.
It got to the point where vasectomies were really becoming a thing.
It was part of a movement called double income, no kids, or DINK.
Which is also the sound I imagine some guys make when they get vasectomies. Dink!
So if people wanted no kids instead of two kids, the Party knew what to do.
Allow them to have three kids!
After all, three times zero is way more than two times zero!
Yeah, the Communist Party usually misses the point.
“Government handouts like cash for babies and tax cuts have failed to
change the underlying fact that many young Chinese people simply do not want children.”
But since when does the Communist Party care what people want?
Xi Jinping is now talking about “a national policy system to boost birthrates.”
I think I can imagine how that will go. He’s a real aphrodi-Xi-ac
But while the shrinking population seems bad enough, the official numbers don’t give us the
full picture. Things could be much, much worse. And it will have a global impact.
I’ll tell you more after this quick commercial break.
Welcome back.
As world leaders meet right now at the World Economic Forum’s annual meeting in Davos,
the question on everyone’s mind is the state of China’s economy.
It’s shrinking along with the population. I haven’t seen something shrink that much since
Insane Clown Posse’s popularity after… the first time people heard about the Insane Clown Posse.
A reporter for state-run Xinhua news said,
“Participants are worried about China’s economic performance this year as they
pinned their hopes on China playing the role of a growth engine in the current economic crisis.”
Even a reporter from Xinhua is saying that?
That’s like a Goomba saying it’s worried about the future of Bowser’s kingdom. Way
to grow a spine. Which is extra impressive since I didn’t know evil mushrooms could grow bones.
As I mentioned, everyone saw China’s demographic crisis coming. But the fact the Communist Party
is admitting it ahead of schedule means the situation is probably much worse.
The Communist Party lies constantly. Even top
Party leaders have admitted China makes up its GDP data.
Covid is another example.
At the end of last year, Chinese officials claimed the death toll
was 5,200 nationwide. For the entire pandemic.
Yeah, I bet those mountains of corpses in funeral homes all died from ice cream headaches.
Shouldn’t have eaten their Baskin Robbins so fast!
Officials have since updated that to 60,000 deaths nationwide. But
that’s still ridiculously low for a country of more than a billion people.
Meanwhile, independent sources estimate the Covid death toll in China could easily be in the
millions. But somehow I doubt those numbers are being reflected in the latest population count.
So back to the overall population decline—which has been happening since before Covid:
The fact the Party is reporting a reporting decline, several years ahead of when they
said it would happen, means the situation is so bad they’re not able to cover it up anymore.
Why would the Party go to such great lengths to cover up a population decline?
Because it hurts China’s economic outlook, which will make foreigners less willing to
invest billions of dollars in China, which will then hurt China’s economy even more.
Speaking of which, here’s another bad sign:
China’s Bureau of Statistics released some new economic data along with the population data.
They say China’s economy grew by only 3% last year, when the Party’s target was 5.5%.
That also means the reality is much worse than
they’re admitting. And it will affect us even here in the US.
“Fewer births in China will lead to economic slowdown, manufacturing recession,
university bankruptcy, and will also lead to high prices and high inflation in the US and EU.”
That’s because the Communist Party has essentially banked China’s entire economy
on being the world’s factory. And the rest of the world has become dependent on it.
Without workers, that sputters to a stop.
Ugh, does that mean that other world leaders are gonna try and help Xi boost birth rates?
This also means less tax revenue for the CCP and an even greater strain on their pension funds.
“Whether or not the government can provide widespread access to elder care,
medical services and a stable stream of income later in life will affect a
long-held assumption that the Communist Party can provide a better life for its people.”
In other words, this could destabilize the Chinese Communist Party to the point of collapse.
Just like so many of the other flavors of disaster they’re on the cusp of.
That’s the thing when a government claims it has all the answers.
It has to take away people’s freedom in order to have control, but inevitably,
the government can’t actually manage things as well as when the people are in charge.
Might want to keep that in mind before you vote for socialist policies in your own countries.
Remember: they seem great on paper. But then again, so do open relationships.
Disasters every single time.
And China Uncensored would not be possible without support from viewers like you—either
by liking and subscribing, sharing the show with friends and family,
or buying one of these awesome “I turned a blind eye to ethnic cleansing in China and all I got
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Patreon. Those are the fans I call the China Uncensored 50 Cent Army, who join us in the fight
against the Chinese Communist Party. As a thank you to them, I responded to their questions.
James asks, “I work with a lot of Chinese people who have only been in my country
for 5 or so years. Is it wise to keep them away from sensitive or valuable information?”
That is the perfectly timed question. Just this week on our other channel,
the China Unscripted podcast, we interviewed ​​an expert on Chinese espionage, Nicholas Eftimiades.
The scope of China’s spying is enormous. It’s not like what most people think of—James Bond
wet works kind of stuff. According to FBI Director Chrisotpher Wray it’s a whole of society approach.
Basically the Communist Party makes use of everyone it can—including forcing ordinary
overseas Chinese people to collect information. And it’s not just state secrets they’re trying
to get. A lot of it is economic espionage, stealing intellectual property and the like.
Yeah, I see you USA Uncensored. You’ll be hearing from my lawyers.
Now I don’t want to encourage you to be suspicious of all Chinese people,
but unfortunately the Communist Party isn’t bothered by using Chinese people
in sometimes nefarious ways. So be sure to vet the background of anyone
from mainland China who has access to sensitive or valuable information.
And if you’d like to learn more,
check out that interview on China Unscripted. I’ll put a link below.
Thanks for your question and your support, James.
And thank you for watching. If you want to support China Uncensored,
all it takes is a dollar per episode over at patreon.com/chinauncensored. Link is below.
China Uncensored would not exist without your support.
Once again I’m Chris Chappell, see you next time.