Top China official's criticism of labour policy sparks controversy
Minister blames labour laws for limiting supply of urban workers and affecting GDP growth
A senior central government official's rare public attack on labour policies has generated heated debate online.
In a speech to students of Tsinghua University's School of Economics and Management on April 24, Finance Minister Lou Jiwei said China had a 50 per cent chance of sliding into the middle-income trap within the next five to 10 years when its annual gross domestic product growth slows to 5 per cent.
The middle-income trap refers to a situation where a country that has achieved stable growth becomes stuck at that level.
Comprehensive reforms were desperately needed to raise the urban labour supply in order to avoid falling into the trap and to ensure an annual 6.5 to 7 per cent GDP growth in the next few years, Lou said, according to Tsinghua's official release on Thursday.
But before the university's release, an unofficial transcript of the speech had already made its rounds on the internet, stirring up controversy over whether the reforms Lou was pushing would come at the price of the nation's workers and farmers.
Lou, known for his reformist outlook and preference for a market-oriented economy, had noted China's growth might stagnate with the rapid erosion of its competitive edge as its large and cheap worker population aged.