I only have one question about this, and it’s not related to their solution to homelessness, because that was brilliant, but instead to the home registration system: some people naturally prefer to live in big cities and some prefer to live in rural areas. What about those situations? Tough luck, your family is from rural China so you must stay in rural China?
it’s a big internal contradiction within china. your hukou(where you’re registered) determines what benefits you have and so its a lot harder for rural residents to work/get benefits/get schooling for their kids. I’ve also heard my mom mention there’s some discrimination/you’d get looked down on from being on the countryside. However, it was necessary to prevent slums from existing and now the restrictions are being relaxed, primarily starting in like 2nd/3rd tier cities i believe.
Edit:
Here’s an article about the progress and rationale behind the hukou system(in english). The rural-urban divide is very clearly noted to be a primary contradiction
“What we now face is the contradiction between unbalanced and inadequate development and the people’s ever-growing needs for a better life,” he said. The evolution of the principal contradiction represents a “historic shift that affects the whole landscape and that creates many new demands for the work of the Party and the country,” Xi said. Previously the principal contradiction was described as one between “the ever-growing material and cultural needs of the people and backward social production.” (quote not from article, from here)
the link won’t open for me so I can’t see the context, but based on my (limited) knowledge you don’t have to stay in one place your whole life. I’m pretty sure you can just… move if you want to, I don’t think there’s anything in the way of that other than the hassle or expenses. For example my cousin’s family moved from a more rural region to one that’s still pretty rural, but only about half an hour or 15 minutes’ worth of walking distance from a relatively small urban center.
Yeah, the link doesn’t mention HOW but he does mention that it’s possible to change your registered location. I assume that there’s a process (maybe prove you have the ability to work and afford the new place or something)?
In my free western country, there’s a process, too. You have to prove all that to, and beg for accommodation from, a private landlord, over whom there is remarkably little oversight and who has the power to decide whether and when I’m no longer welcome in any given city, town, etc.
From what I read, it’s not nearly as oppressive as it sounds on paper. It definitely takes some work and jumping through hoops and going through multiple channels, but your hukou can be changed. I’ve never been to China though, just gleaming from what I’ve read.
Rural land is organized in communes, you can move to the countryside from the city, but you must be invited into the commune or rent from it as a tenant, costing you for the privilege of using their land.
The cities are only so big as they are developed, and growth takes time and energy. Due to the market, living in the cities costs more, so you can move from the countryside to the cities, if you can afford it (i.e. stable job), which is hard because the city can only plan for so many jobs in any given time.
Moving like that is difficult, and is more expensive than staying put, because the real economic cost of such a move has an expensive impact on the whole economy. This applies everywhere, which is why some lineages haven’t left Southside Chicago or South Central LA since it those neighborhoods were redlined, and the life expectancy is almost a decade shorter than the metro average:
Movement only “feels free” in the US, because much of the population is able to pay for the freedom of movement (using surplus labor).
This system is also partially why many of the big cities are provinces in their own. It gives provincial, and hukuo powers to the urbanites to decide how they want to grow (within the constraints of the overall state plan). In the US, instead it’s often people with freedom cash pushing out existing urbanites, sometimes into the outskirts, sometimes into more concentrated enclaves, sometimes onto the streets.
I only have one question about this, and it’s not related to their solution to homelessness, because that was brilliant, but instead to the home registration system: some people naturally prefer to live in big cities and some prefer to live in rural areas. What about those situations? Tough luck, your family is from rural China so you must stay in rural China?
it’s a big internal contradiction within china. your hukou(where you’re registered) determines what benefits you have and so its a lot harder for rural residents to work/get benefits/get schooling for their kids. I’ve also heard my mom mention there’s some discrimination/you’d get looked down on from being on the countryside. However, it was necessary to prevent slums from existing and now the restrictions are being relaxed, primarily starting in like 2nd/3rd tier cities i believe.
Edit: Here’s an article about the progress and rationale behind the hukou system(in english). The rural-urban divide is very clearly noted to be a primary contradiction
“What we now face is the contradiction between unbalanced and inadequate development and the people’s ever-growing needs for a better life,” he said. The evolution of the principal contradiction represents a “historic shift that affects the whole landscape and that creates many new demands for the work of the Party and the country,” Xi said. Previously the principal contradiction was described as one between “the ever-growing material and cultural needs of the people and backward social production.” (quote not from article, from here)
the link won’t open for me so I can’t see the context, but based on my (limited) knowledge you don’t have to stay in one place your whole life. I’m pretty sure you can just… move if you want to, I don’t think there’s anything in the way of that other than the hassle or expenses. For example my cousin’s family moved from a more rural region to one that’s still pretty rural, but only about half an hour or 15 minutes’ worth of walking distance from a relatively small urban center.
Yeah, the link doesn’t mention HOW but he does mention that it’s possible to change your registered location. I assume that there’s a process (maybe prove you have the ability to work and afford the new place or something)?
In my free western country, there’s a process, too. You have to prove all that to, and beg for accommodation from, a private landlord, over whom there is remarkably little oversight and who has the power to decide whether and when I’m no longer welcome in any given city, town, etc.
Don’t forget that there’s always the possibility that even if you manage to get that permission, they have multiple ways to revoke it afterwards, too.
That’s pretty awesome. If you don’t mind me asking, what city?
I’m not exactly sure but it’s in the Huangshan district in Anhui.
From what I read, it’s not nearly as oppressive as it sounds on paper. It definitely takes some work and jumping through hoops and going through multiple channels, but your hukou can be changed. I’ve never been to China though, just gleaming from what I’ve read.
Rural land is organized in communes, you can move to the countryside from the city, but you must be invited into the commune or rent from it as a tenant, costing you for the privilege of using their land.
The cities are only so big as they are developed, and growth takes time and energy. Due to the market, living in the cities costs more, so you can move from the countryside to the cities, if you can afford it (i.e. stable job), which is hard because the city can only plan for so many jobs in any given time.
Moving like that is difficult, and is more expensive than staying put, because the real economic cost of such a move has an expensive impact on the whole economy. This applies everywhere, which is why some lineages haven’t left Southside Chicago or South Central LA since it those neighborhoods were redlined, and the life expectancy is almost a decade shorter than the metro average:
Movement only “feels free” in the US, because much of the population is able to pay for the freedom of movement (using surplus labor).
This system is also partially why many of the big cities are provinces in their own. It gives provincial, and hukuo powers to the urbanites to decide how they want to grow (within the constraints of the overall state plan). In the US, instead it’s often people with freedom cash pushing out existing urbanites, sometimes into the outskirts, sometimes into more concentrated enclaves, sometimes onto the streets.
edit: i just realized i already commented so i’m adding the link i just commented to my other comment ignore this one