|
Business and Finance
China's "gray" economy: what about the handjobs?Posted by Maya Alexandri on Friday, June 15, 2007 at 11:25 AM
 Busted at the hair salon According to the study, called "The Condition of National Income Distribution and Gray Income," "gray" income goes hand-in-hand with wealth. The report identifies the following contributing factors to "gray" income: a lack of regulatory control over investment capital, poor transparency of investment capital flows, and "serious abuses and leaks." The report points out that, in recent years, investment in real estate projects with multiple layers of sub-contracts have created opportunities for "leakage." The problem, concludes Wang Xiaoyu, who headed the group that prepared the study, is not "marketization, but the institutions that foster corruption." It's not surprising that the study found "gray" income to be a problem of China's affluent class, given its methodology. The study's authors surveyed more than 2,000 residents across China from different class backgrounds. The survey results were then compared to data collected by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS). The difference between the per capita disposable income levels reported in the survey and those recorded by NBS was identified as "gray" income. But NBS admits that ferreting out the actual income of high-income residents is a "headache problem," and 70% of high-income residents who participated in the survey said they are unwilling to disclose their true income situation to NBS. Maybe the income of rich Chinese includes a greater proportion of "gray" income than their poorer countrymen, or maybe the disparity is an accounting phantom that vanishes in daylight. What the light of day exposes in your correspondent's hutong is vigorous participation by the laobaixing in China's "gray" economy, from the hair salon-cum-handjob shack down the street, to the "adult health" sex shop one alley over, to the gambling establishment across from the community center. And while reporting on corruption-related "gray" income may advance an important political agenda, denying the existence of the seedier "gray" economy — the one dominated by China's poorer folk — makes no sense. After all, the true size and robustness of China's economy can never be reflected in data that fails to count the handjobs. Links and Sources
|
Partner Links
Jobs in China
Recent Comments
Henry on
The Eurasian Face
Caroline W on
Big in China
Michael on
Julia Lovell on translating Lu Xun's complete fiction: "His is an angry, searing vision of China"
Brandon K. on
Clueless academic takes on popular fantasy novels
Media Partners
Visit these sites for the latest China news
China Media Timeline
Major media events over the last three decades
Danwei Model Workers
The latest recommended blogs and new media
 From 2008
Books on China
 The Eurasian Face : Blacksmith Books, a publishing house in Hong Kong, is behind The Eurasian Face, a collection of photographs by Kirsteen Zimmern. Below is an excerpt from the series:
Big in China: An adapted excerpt from Big In China: My Unlikely Adventures Raising A Family, Playing The Blues and Becoming A Star in China, just published this month. Author Alan Paul tells the story of arriving in Beijing as a trailing spouse, starting a blues band, raising kids and trying to make sense of China.
Pallavi Aiyar's Chinese Whiskers: Pallavi Aiyar's first novel, Chinese Whiskers, a modern fable set in contemporary Beijing, will be published in January 2011. Aiyar currently lives in Brussels where she writes about Europe for the Business Standard. Below she gives permissions for an excerpt.
Front Page of the Day
A different newspaper every weekday
From the Vault
Classic Danwei posts
+ Korean history doesn't fly on Chinese TV screens (2007.09): SARFT puts the kibbosh on Korean historical dramas. + Religion and government in an uneasy mix (2008.03): Phoenix Weekly (凤凰周刊) article from October, 2007, on government influence on religious practice in Tibet. + David Moser on Mao impersonators (2004.10): I first became aware of this phenomenon in 1992 when I turned on a Beijing TV variety show and was jolted by the sight of "Mao Zedong" and "Zhou Enlai" playing a game of ping pong. They both gave short, rousing speeches, and then were reverently interviewed by the emcee, who thanked them profusely for taking time off from their governmental duties to appear on the show.
Danwei Archives
Danwei Feeds
Via Feedsky
 (on the mainland)or Feedburner  (blocked in China) Main feed: Main posts (FB has top links) Top Links: Links from the top bar Danwei Jobs: Want ads Danwei Digest: Updated daily, 19:30 |
 |
Chinese media, advertising, and urban life. |
|
tweet
facebook
bookmark
HaoHao
digg
Comments on China's "gray" economy: what about the handjobs?
does this "grey" economy include civil servants,cops, etc. turning in tens of thousands of yuan of fapiao for business trips or dinners that they never went to or paid for every month? does it include signing an "official" contract for a large amount then signing a real contract for less and the buyers getting a cut of the difference? hell, ask anyone over the age of 30 and they'll tell you that if you have any hope of making cash you have to find some way to make "extra" money simply by doing your job.
so . . . how are the handjobs in your hutong? or did you mean to suggest that you're not one us "laobaixing"?
Maya,
Brilliant post.
China's grey economy is the size of the US defense budget.
One could argue that the grey economy is China's only functioning social safety net for the castoff workers of downsized state-owned enterprises. The challenge for the government is to figure out how to tax these activities without killing them...or, in the case of the rub-and-tug barbershops, without admitting they exist.
David
"And while reporting on corruption-related "gray" income may advance an important political agenda, denying the existence of the seedier "gray" economy — the one dominated by China's poorer folk — makes no sense."
Uh, right. So were you planning on looking at the whole country, or just your little slice of urban Beijing? Because I can assure you, rural Beijing does not look even remotely like what you describe, Ms Alexandri.
@chriswaugh_bj:
You think there are no handjob shacks in the countryside? Think again my friend.
You know what, why the police have to feel like they need to go around and bust people like that (I just saw the East South West North photos).
Vice? Give me a break. Sex is the most natural thing. It's been around since the ancient times man. Why do humans have this need to regulate sex?
If they doing this for health reasons then they should make it legal and regulate it as an industry. Make them pay taxes.
Busting people for making a living is b.s. Most of these people are living a hard life already, yet people still feel the need to mess with them. Sex workers are human beings.