After years of famine and massive families, the Chinese government instituted a fairly strict one couple, one child policy. Since it began in 1979, the Chinese government estimates it has prevented over 250 million people from being added to the already overpopulated Chinese countryside. However, there’s been an unintended side-effect. By 2020, there may be as many as 24 million unmarried Chinese men aimlessly roaming the countryside. China is a national sausage fest: too many men, not enough women.
Unless China institutes polygamy, which isn’t likely, this gender imbalance is going to persist. Chinese families save their only child for a male child, as girls are less desirable in Chinese culture. They use gender testing in utero, have an abortion if the baby isn’t the right sex, and repeat. This is illegal under Chinese law, but especially in rural areas, it’s all too common.
While couples can have more than one child if they pay a hefty fee, and now rural couples are allowed to have a second child if the first one is a girl, that won’t address the gender imbalance that persists. While some clever couples have been taking fertility treatments to have multiple children at once, thus skirting the law, that won’t do anything for the current generation of lonely Chinese men, most of whom can’t afford a robotic girlfriend.
Tags: China, too many men, not enough girls, 25 million unmarried Chinese men, population crisis, baby bust, one child only policy backfires, one child policy, one couple one child, family planning
