Hong Kong Commercial Daily:
What progress has been made in ensuring people's livelihoods in 2020? The growth of China's per capita disposable income has been weak, how do you regard this situation? What changes have there been in income levels in urban and rural areas? Thank you.
Ning Jizhe:
People's livelihoods are the top priority. Last year, notable results were achieved in ensuring people's wellbeing, as demonstrated in three key aspects: first, job growth continued to expand; second, prices remained generally stable; and third, incomes continued to rise. As I said before, we achieved the year's employment rate target, and the employment situation was better than expected. With support from economic recovery and employment-first polices, the number of newly employed people in urban areas totaled 11.86 million in 2020, well exceeding the goal of 9 million. The surveyed unemployment rate and registered unemployment rate, both for urban areas, were lower than expected. It shows that governments at all levels and market entities have all played a vital role in stabilizing and ensuring employment as the main macro-regulation target, and implementing the employment-first policies.
In addition, consumer prices remained generally stable. Affected by many factors, food prices, especially the price of pork, rose quickly starting around the beginning of last year. Faced with the epidemic, local governments, departments and market entities worked together to boost food supplies, in particular guaranteeing the production, distribution, and supply of hogs. After more than half a year of efforts, the number of hogs both available for slaughter and supplied to the market improved significantly in the fourth quarter. We increased pork imports and ensured domestic supply, resulting in a significant drop in prices during the fourth quarter. Pork prices rose by more than 100% at the beginning of last year, and increased for 19 consecutive months. Between October and December, pork prices then dropped by 2.8%, 12.5% and 1.3%, respectively. Food prices on the whole have also been effectively controlled, showing a downward trend.
Personal income growth exceeded expectations and was basically in step with economic growth. The per capita disposable income in the four quarters changed by -3.9%, -1.3%, -0.6% and 2.1% year on year in real terms, which was generally in step with economic growth. The main characteristics of the growth in residents' incomes can be seen from three aspects: First, net transfer income of residents has grown quickly. This resulted from the policies to ensure and improve people's basic livelihood, such as increasing the pension for retirees and strengthening social relief and temporary aid. The per capita net transfer income of residents nationwide grew 8.7% year on year; per capita old-age pension and retirement pension posted an 7.8% increase year on year; per capita income from social relief and subsidies grew 18.7%; and per capita income from policy-based living subsidies rose by 12.7%. Second, residents' income from salaries showed accelerated recovery through the policies of ensuring employment, including stabilizing employment and encouraging rural labor to move to other areas for employment. The per capita salary-based income of residents increased by 4.3% year on year, which was higher than the growth rate of China’s per capita disposable income, which was 2.1%. The average monthly income of migrant workers also rose by 2.8% over the previous year. Third, market entities improved net operating income, moving from decline to growth. Thanks to the measures including reducing taxes and fees, and providing financial support, household operations improved. The per capita net operating income grew 1.1% year on year in 2020, despite decline during the first three quarters due to the epidemic.
As for your second question, the income gap between urban and rural residents as well as people from different social groups continued to narrow. As I said before, the ratio between urban and rural residents per capita disposable income stood at 2.56, 0.08 lower than in 2019. The income of residents in western regions of the country grew by 6%, faster than 4.6% in eastern regions, showing that the income gap between different regions is also narrowing. The income growth rate of the low-income group was higher than that of residents nationwide. The per capita disposable income of the low-income group increased by 6.6% year on year in nominal terms, 1.9 percentage points higher than that of residents nationwide. The per capita disposable income of the low-income group in rural areas increased by 9.8% over the previous year, 5.1 percentage points higher than that of residents nationwide. As such, data on job creation, consumer prices and income show that the policies to ensure and improve people's livelihoods have yielded positive results.
In the next step, we will continue to promote steady economic recovery and provide stronger employment support for key groups. We will take more measures to stabilize employment, ensure supply and price stability, and strengthen basic living guarantees for disadvantaged groups. There should be solid progress in protecting market entities, sustaining the growth of urban and rural personal income, deepening the reform of the income distribution system, and further narrowing the income gap between urban and rural residents. Thank you.
