A recently released Credit Suisse’s annual Global Wealth Report underlines China’s impressive performance where the China economy has come a long way in a very short time. In 1978, the country’s gross domestic product was $148 billion; today it’s $12.24 trillion, an 8,000 percent increase.
As China’s economy has grown, so has the wealth of its citizens. Here is the snapshot of the country’s economic development, according to the Credit Suisse report.
China mints even more new millionaires
One of the trends that’s defined Chinese economy in recent years is the consistent growth in the number of new millionaires. That growth continued in 2018, when 186,000 more people joined the ranks of the country’s richest. While China had just 41,000 millionaires in 2000, today it has more than 3.5 million. The country is also now second only to the United States in its share of the world’s dollar millionaires (8 percent).
A growing economy, a growing share of the global pie
In 2000, North America, Europe, and Asia-Pacific (not including India and China) commanded 92 percent of global wealth. In 2018, that dropped to 78 percent. The cause for that decline was, of course, China, whose own share of global wealth increased from 3.1 percent to 16.4 percent in that same time period.
Non-financial assets have driven China’s growth
Growth in non-financial assets such as property and land has been a primary driver of growth, not just in China, but also Europe and India as well. In 2018, non-financial wealth represented 62.2 percent of China’s gross wealth, a 1.5 percent increase from 2017. This pattern is typical of developing countries, where nonfinancial assets make up a relatively large proportion of household wealth. (In contrast, in North America, where financial wealth dominates, non-financial wealth represented just 29.3 percent of gross wealth.)
China’s women are benefiting from the country’s climb
A rising tide lifts all boats: As China’s overall wealth continues to climb, the country’s women are also benefiting. In 2018, 30-40 percent of China’s wealth was in the hands of women, according to Credit Suisse estimates.
Discover the full 2018 Global Wealth Report here
China has grown quickly to become the world’s fifth leading study destination
Source – ICEF Monitor
Chinese universities and schools hosted almost 490,000 students in 2017, an increase of 10.5% over the previous year. The growing profile of China’s leading institutions, an expanding scholarship scheme (especially for students enrolling in degree programs), the powerful Chinese economy, and the relative affordability of Chinese higher education have been notable factors in China’s growing share of the world’s international students
Top sending countries for China in 2017 included South Korea, Thailand, Pakistan, the United States, India, Russia, Japan, Indonesia, Kazakhstan, and Laos.
In 2017, the Chinese government introduced a new policy allowing foreign students with post-graduate degrees or higher from Chinese or “well-known” foreign universities to be offered employment within a year after graduation and this measure should make the destination more attractive to international students.