Double happiness for second-time Chinese parents in new year; mothers try to delay birth
Mothers who made it across the line to give birth to their second child after January 1 won’t have to pay thousands of yuan in fines
There were sighs of relief across the country on Friday among parents who held off having their second child until the new year.
Those mothers who delivered their second child after the clock struck 2016 will not be hit with a hefty fine for breaching the one-child policy, which ended on January 1. The fine ranged from tens of thousands to hundreds of thousands of yuan, depending on the average annual household income in the area and the parents’ earnings.
The new year brought double happiness for one Fujian family. Their baby was due on December 27 but the child was not born until the morning of January 1, Fujian Daily reported.
The late arrival saved the family 80,000 yuan (HK$95,000) in fines, prompting the infant’s grandmother to give him the nickname Ba Wan, or “eighty thousand”, the report said.
“Each day passed like a year and we wished time pass quicker. How we wished there was no December 31!” the father was quoted as saying.
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A 41-year-old Hangzhou man was also relieved when the new year came and went. His wife, who was due on December 26, had not given birth, saving them half a million yuan, the Qianjiang Evening News reported.