Growing China’s Middle Class

Growing China’s Middle Class

Economic pundits are coming to grips with a new global realty check. The realization that industrialized double digit export growth in China is unsustainable. However, that has not deterred Chinese policymakers from eyeing new sustainable growth strategies to propel China into the preeminent world economic power.

One secret weapon could be China’s middle class, now the biggest in the world. Growing much faster than America’s, China’s has the potential to increase an estimated 73% by 2020.  Adapting that swelling middle class to a service, consumer, and private consumption economy will drive long-term social stability, generate higher employment growth and expand the middle class into the economically challenged rural northwest and western regions.

Shifts in China’s urban middle class have occurred at a brisk pace for the last decade. Quick advancement into higher economic brackets is a common occurrence. Spending habits of these consumers are not only influenced by income but by brand awareness.  The young, well-educated and price sensitive, seek the latest fashion to stand out from their peers. The older more experienced middle class demand better quality in goods and service.

Yes, purchasing behavior and demographic features vary among the different sub-segments within China’s middle class. However, most are interested in the latest products as well as the world outside of China. The other characteristic of these ambitious consumers is — they are looking to classic American lifestyles for inspiration to build their own financial dreams.

What better blueprint is there for China then the code of America’s “Quiet Rich”? To understanding the lives of those humble yet dynamic American millionaires who rose from meager beginnings will greatly benefit China’s emerging classes and grow China from the inside out.