Money Magazine   ©

Money Magazine   ©

follow

This article is from WeChat official account: Financial magazine (ID: i-caijing), written by Zhang Mingli, edited by Wang Yanchun, and the title is from Visual China

Article Summary

This article introduces the situation of the cities with the highest population growth in 2023, analyzes the reasons and influencing factors of population growth.

• •    Nine provinces have achieved population growth, with only Guangdong, Guangxi, Guizhou, and Qinghai having a positive natural population growth rate

• •    The population growth of new first tier cities is at the forefront, with Hefei, Zhengzhou, Hangzhou, and Chengdu becoming popular cities for attracting population

• •    Hainan's fertility rate is rising against the trend, and it belongs to high fertility areas along with Guizhou, Qinghai, and Guangxi

As of April 23, in addition to Heilongjiang and Xizang, 29 provinces have released their 2023 population data. According to the data compiled by Caijing, a total of nine provinces have achieved population growth, of which only Guangdong, Guangxi, Guizhou and Qinghai have positive natural population growth rates.

The highest natural growth rate is in Guizhou (2.88 ‰), followed by Guangdong (2.76 ‰), Qinghai (1.68 ‰), and Guangxi (0.42 ‰).

Population growth includes both natural growth and mechanical growth (i.e. "net population inflow"). Among the nine provinces with population growth, some areas are mainly due to natural population growth, such as Guizhou, while others are mainly benefited from population mechanical growth, such as Jiangsu, Zhejiang, and Shanghai in the Yangtze River Delta and Beijing Tianjin in North China; Some places have both natural and mechanical population growth, such as Guangdong.

Xiao Jincheng, Chairman of the China Association of Land and Resources Economics, told Caijing that with the overall decline in natural population growth rate, it is reasonable for most provinces to experience negative population growth. Among provinces with a growing population, Guangdong has received a large number of agricultural migrant workers and migrant workers, and most of these people are young and have the ability to conceive, which has a positive impact on population growth.

Li Jia, Vice President and Senior Researcher of the Institute of Aging Society at Pangu Think Tank, told Caijing that negative population growth in many regions is closely related to population mobility and low fertility. Currently, over a quarter of China's population is migrating and gathering in urban areas, with the majority being both working age and childbearing age. The flow and reproductive choices of these people directly affect the total population and population structure of the inflow and outflow areas.

Therefore, population growth not only reflects the trend of aging population, but also reflects differences in inter provincial economic development, population mobility trends, and urbanization progress. "The different population growth rates in each province mainly reflect the problem of uneven development in various regions. In areas with good economic conditions and high industrial agglomeration, the population growth rate is bound to be faster," said Li Jia.

1、 New first tier cities with high population growth

Data shows that in 2023, the permanent population of ten provinces (municipalities directly under the central government, the same below) showed positive growth, namely: Zhejiang (increasing by 500000 people), Guangdong (increasing by 490000 people), Hainan (increasing by 160000 people), Shanghai (increasing by 115600 people), Jiangsu (increasing by 110000 people), Xinjiang (increasing by 110000 people), Guizhou (increasing by 90000 people), Fujian (increasing by 50000 people), Beijing (increasing by 15000 people), and Tianjin (increasing by 10000 people).

Guangdong has been the only province with a birth population of over 1 million for four consecutive years, and has been the largest province in terms of childbirth for six consecutive years; After Guangdong, Henan, a populous province in central China, had a total birth population of 695000 last year, ranking second; Shandong had a birth population of 610000 last year, ranking third.

Among them, the provinces with increasing permanent population are mainly in the south, especially in the Yangtze River Delta and Pearl River Delta, while in northern cities, only Beijing and Tianjin are experiencing positive growth. Caijing found that compared to traditional popular cities such as Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, and Shenzhen, new first tier cities are more popular. Among the cities that have released population data for 2023, the top four cities with incremental growth are Hefei (increasing by 219000 people), Zhengzhou (increasing by 180000 people), Hangzhou (increasing by 146000 people), and Chengdu (increasing by 135000 people), all of which are new first tier cities and are provincial capitals.

"Overall, the first attraction of these cities is employment. Cities with developed industries have more job opportunities and higher salary levels, attracting more labor force. Moreover, the higher the economic level, the more developed the industries, the stronger the ability to attract and absorb population, and the more it can stimulate economic development," said Li Jia.

Xiao Jincheng told Caijing that the economies of the four new first tier cities mentioned above are very dynamic, especially after the implementation of the integrated development strategy in the Yangtze River Delta, Hefei's innovative vitality has been stimulated, and it has taken on the industrial transfer of the Yangtze River Delta urban agglomeration, creating many employment opportunities; With the policy support of the Chengdu Chongqing Economic Circle, Chengdu has also shown impressive performance in economic development and industrial structure upgrading.

In addition, Li Jia stated that based on the proportion of mobile population absorbed by these cities, the majority of the province's mobile population is concentrated within the province. Due to their proximity in geographical location, the industries of these central cities are highly attractive within the province. When the industrial development of central cities in the province reaches a certain level, it will also drive other cities in the province, thus achieving balanced development. In the short term, the attractiveness of new first tier cities remains high, with strong industrial agglomeration capabilities. The development model of urban agglomerations and urban agglomerations will become increasingly common in the future.

2、 Hainan has a top fertility rate

According to a review by Caijing, compared to the aforementioned new first tier cities, traditional popular cities such as Beijing and Shanghai have a relatively small increase in population, with Beijing having only 15000 people.

Xiao Jincheng told Caijing that in order to alleviate non capital functions, Beijing has undergone a large-scale industrial transfer, with a significant reduction in labor-intensive industries such as wholesale and manufacturing, and a corresponding decrease in demand for ordinary labor. At the same time, Beijing has introduced relevant regulatory policies to control population growth. In addition, the increase in parenting costs has also led to a decrease in the willingness of the childbearing age population to have children.

"From a policy perspective, although Shanghai is not as strict as Beijing, it is still in the process of industrial transfer." Xiao Jincheng said, but he does not believe that the popularity of traditional popular cities is declining. Cities such as Beijing and Shanghai still have an attraction for high-end talents, and there are more and more policies targeting high-end talents to stay in Shanghai and Beijing.

Li Jia told Caijing that northern cities mainly adopt an absorptive development model. Southern cities, on the other hand, exhibit more radiative development, with relatively balanced and dispersed absorption of population from surrounding cities. "There are still some habitual choices for population mobility in southern provinces," said Li Jia. For example, migrant populations in Hunan and Hubei tend to choose Guangdong more. The reasons for this are: firstly, similar geographical locations; secondly, similar climatic conditions; and thirdly, cultural commonalities. This situation is also reflected in the north, but not as obvious as in the south.

From the perspective of birth rate, among the provinces that have released data, six provinces have a population birth rate exceeding 8 ‰, namely Guizhou, Hainan, Qinghai, Yunnan, Guangdong, and Guangxi, mainly located in the western and southern regions. Li Jia stated that Guizhou belongs to a multi-ethnic region in terms of population structure, with a high willingness to have children, and a good trend in industrial development, with strong ability to absorb employment.

Caijing found that provinces with lower natural population growth rates include Liaoning (-5.63 ‰), Jilin (-5.39 ‰), Inner Mongolia (-3.42 ‰), Chongqing (-3.32 ‰), Sichuan (-3.12 ‰), Hunan (-3.08 ‰), Tianjin (-2.57 ‰), and Shanghai (-2.42 ‰). Li Jia believes that these data are not surprising. Since 2018, the natural population growth rate of the above-mentioned cities has shown a continuous downward trend.

Xiao Jincheng believes that the large population outflow from the Northeast and Central and Western regions is mainly influenced by the economy. The economic development of the above-mentioned regions is significantly lagging behind the Yangtze River Delta, Pearl River Delta, Beijing Tianjin Hebei and other regions, resulting in a significant amount of population loss. Tianjin and Shanghai, as super large cities, have longer life expectancy, higher levels of aging, and a decrease in the number of people of childbearing age. Meanwhile, young people in big cities generally have a lower willingness to have children, and even some older adults choose not to get married.

At the same time as the overall decline in birth population and birth rate in various provinces, the annual birth population and birth rate in Hainan Province are showing a trend of recovery. In 2023, the number of births in the province increased by 7900 compared to the previous year; The birth rate has increased by 0.68 percentage points compared to the previous year, and is 2.89 percentage points higher than the national average.

Since 2018, the fertility rate of Hainan has been at a high level, ranking the first echelon with Xizang, Qinghai and Guangxi, far higher than that of Guangdong and Shandong. "The rise of Hainan's fertility rate against the trend benefited from taking the lead in getting rid of the impact of the epidemic. Therefore, it is necessary to compare the fertility rate of a region with earlier data." Li Jia said that Hainan, Xizang, Guangxi and Qinghai are all underdeveloped regions, but the fertility rate is at a high level, because the fertility desire of ethnic minorities is higher than that of the Han nationality.

Xiao Jincheng believes that the important factors that determine the regional fertility rate are: economic development, industrial vitality, employment opportunities, and the influx of fertile labor force. Taking Hainan as an example, the establishment of a free trade port has a greater attraction to the population, and the incoming population also has a higher willingness to have children. Since last year, there has been a phenomenon in Hainan where air tickets and train tickets are difficult to obtain, which means that Hainan needs more people to engage in related service industries.

Li Jia believes that the three important factors that affect fertility are fertility value, fertility, and fertility environment. Among them, the value of reproduction is also emphasized. A major factor leading to a decline in birth rates is the development of diversity in reproductive value. "There are three universal values of fertility: first, the pleasure of inheritance and family affection; second, the new labor force; and third, the effectiveness of children's elderly care security. However, in the current environment, these three values are gradually weakening."

3、 How to Look at Inter provincial Population Competition

Although the national population data for 2024 has not yet been released, it is not difficult to see from the population data of various provinces that negative population growth will be the norm.

At the peak of population growth, competing for existing population has become a choice for each province. Previously, it was not uncommon for provinces to engage in "human resource wars".

Some cities mainly retain talents by relaxing their housing purchase policies. Taking Xiamen as an example, in February 2024, the Xiamen Housing and Urban Rural Development Bureau issued a document to relax the restrictions on housing purchase for all non registered residence registered talents with bachelor's degree or above, intermediate or above professional title or senior worker or above professional qualification. Those who meet the above conditions can purchase a commercial housing if they have been in stable employment for more than one year in Xiamen and have no housing.

The difficulty of talent settlement is also decreasing. Taking Qingdao as an example, in November 2023, the Qingdao Municipal Government issued the Notice on Further Deepening the Reform of the registered residence System, emphasizing that students in secondary technical schools, technical colleges and vocational schools of Qingdao University can be admitted to collective school households; Students from other vocational colleges, technical colleges, and vocational colleges, as well as students with equivalent academic qualifications from overseas, may be admitted to talent collective households in various districts (cities).

The amount of talent rewards is gradually increasing. Taking Nansha, Guangzhou as an example, in May 2023, Nansha released the "Nine Measures for Gathering Talents in the Guangzhou Nansha International Talent Zone", which emphasized that top and high-level talents will be rewarded with up to 10 million yuan, high-level talent teams will be rewarded with 100 million yuan in innovation and entrepreneurship, and senior skilled craftsmen will be rewarded with up to 1 million yuan.

Several experts interviewed by Caijing stated that the trend of population mobility can reflect changes in public policies and economic conditions in a region, acting as a local "beacon".

Li Jia told Caijing that there is still a certain gap between the employment and entrepreneurship environment in Northeast China and southern provinces, with low wage income levels and room for improvement in public policy support.

Li Jia specifically mentioned that he expects population mobility to shift from increasing quantity to improving quality in the future. One is reflected in measures to attract local population, and the other is reflected in the attractiveness of universities. For example, Wuhan has established a recruitment bureau specifically to provide relevant guarantees and preferential measures for high-quality talents to work in Wuhan. At present, the admission rate of the college entrance examination is about 90%, and high-quality university resources are mainly concentrated in first - and second tier cities. After four to seven years of campus life, most students choose to work in the location of their university or in nearby cities. Therefore, universities also play a significant role in promoting population mobility.

Some experts and scholars believe that the competition between cities in talent attraction has a good starting point, but there is a need to be vigilant about possible negative spillover effects. For example, the talent grabbing policy is linked to household registration and purchasing qualifications, which may trigger phenomena such as "empty household registration" and "floating cities"; The talent attraction policy indirectly subsidizes public resources to college students, which may have a certain crowding out effect on other labor groups such as agricultural migrant workers; Third - and fourth tier cities may be severely impacted by the competition for talent from first - and second tier cities, which to some extent exacerbates the imbalance and coordination of regional development.

Xiao Jincheng does not agree with the reward based "grabbing people policy". At present, local talent competition still focuses on high-end talents, even cutting-edge talents. But Xiao Jincheng believes that inclusive policies are more reasonable, such as Nanjing and Hangzhou's policy of "settling down first and then finding a job" for college students. This type of policy is more effective in addressing the issue of living security faced by college students, and their willingness to settle down for employment is also stronger. At the same time, the population covered by similar policies should also be expanded, such as migrant workers and other groups.

Xiao Jincheng told Caijing that from a national perspective, due to the rapid promotion of equalization of public services, the differentiation of public policies is not significant. However, from the perspective of economic development, the economic development in the southern region is more rapid than that in the north, and industries are mainly labor-intensive, with more employment opportunities. At the same time, the influx of workers is mainly young people, which has a certain promoting effect on improving fertility rates.

The mobility of existing population has become a key factor in the competition among provinces for population. At the end of 2023, the permanent population of Zhejiang increased by 500000, with a total of 66.27 million people, making it the province with the largest increase in existing data. However, the natural population growth rate in Zhejiang last year was -0.86 ‰, which means that the population with natural growth decreased by 57000 people, and the net inflow of population from outside Zhejiang was 557000 people.

In 2020, Professor Li Jianxin from Peking University predicted that with the negative population growth in various provinces, the future population reproduction will enter a "shrinking type", which has become a common trend. The era of relying on internal population migration or mobility to fill the "population gap" within the province has come to an end.

"If governments at all levels continue to strive to cope with the potential risks of negative population growth through population migration or migration, it may lead to vicious competition due to attracting population. While the problem of negative population growth in some regions is alleviated, it will exacerbate the problems in others. Therefore, policies aimed at competing for talent through population migration or migration in different regions are just a zero sum game," said Li Jianxin.

Li Jia believes that in the future, attracting existing population will definitely be the main means of population competition between provinces and regions. However, the development of intelligent industry may have an impact on the form of population competition. In the past, most workers needed to possess certain qualities and skills to be able to work, but now this requirement is becoming an unnecessary condition. So, the competition for the future stock population may escalate into the competition for high-quality stock population. Cities with underdeveloped educational resources will be at a disadvantage in new competition.

But Xiao Jincheng told Caijing that there may not necessarily be absolute competition between cities in terms of population issues. Economic development determines population flow and agglomeration. Meanwhile, public services such as education and healthcare also determine the population's willingness to have children. However, these two points are not fixed and cannot be judged from a single point in time to determine the impact of population mobility on cities. It is necessary to look at the long-term effects of population outflow and inflow on the economic development of a city.

In Xiao Jincheng's view, the current level of economic development in the areas of population outflow is bound to be lower than that in the areas of population inflow, but the development of the outflow areas will not stagnate. Whether the trend of population outflow can be reversed depends on the future industrial development of the city.

This article is from WeChat official account: Financial magazine (ID: i-caijing). Author: Zhang Mingli, Editor: Wang Yanchun

This content is the author's independent viewpoint and does not represent the Tiger Smell position. Reproduction is not allowed without permission. For authorization matters, please contact us hezuo@huxiu.com

If you have any objections or complaints about this manuscript, please contact us tougao@huxiu.com

People who are changing and want to change the world are all on the Tiger Smell app

谁是2023年人口增长最多的城市？

财经杂志©关注