BEIJING (Reuters) -China’s President Xi Jinping said everyone in China will “basically achieve common prosperity” – a key policy goal to reduce inequality – by around mid-century while warning against government over-promising on social welfare.
“Common prosperity” is a broad policy drive to narrow the gap between rich and poor. It has involved a wave of regulatory crackdowns on excesses in industries including technology and private tuition.
The gap between people’s income and consumption should be narrowed to a “reasonable range” by mid-century, Xi said in an essay in the ruling Communist Party journal Qiushi, published by the official Xinhua news agency.
But Xi also said that the government should not make promises it could not deliver on and avoid the “trap” of “welfarism” and helping the lazy.
While the “ossification” of social classes should be prevented, so should “lying flat”, said Xi, referring to a trend among China’s youth to embrace passivity and step back from intense competition in the world’s second largest economy.
Xi also said that salaries of grassroots-level civil servants and workers at state-owned enterprises should be increased.
(Reporting by Gabriel Crossley, Stella Qiu and Yew Lun Tian; editing by John Stonestreet, William Maclean)
