Some Thoughts About China

[Icky]

Was listening to a story on NPR yesterday... they mentioned the "one child" policy... they said this has produced a situation where one child has MANY family members doing EVERYTHING for the child... The children grow up wanting for little and not learning many "life skills" like laundry, cooking, cleaning, etc...
A LOT of pressure is put on the children because the future is completely up to them... Very few kids to take care a very many aged....

We think the "Baby Boomers" retirement is going to be a burden on the relative few of us still working... This will be a cake walk compared to what China must certainly face in the next 20 years or so...

Also (as I mentioned in some other thread somewhere along the way) the women outnumber the men bigtime! This is going to be a stress on their culture.... so many 'unmarried' men - how shameful...

It's going to be a very dynamic period for China ... I wonder how well they will deal with all the stress...???

[Nanette]

Icky, you know it would not surprise me if the let the aged just die. Many cultures do that for sheer survival. It sounds cruel and inhumane, but for a lot of cultures it is a way of life. I believe the eskimo people do that. When the person gets past beting useful and becomes a burden they just wander off to die on their own.

I don't know how a population such as China has could ever deal with that many aged people with so few younger folks to carry the load. I can't see their government stepping in and taking care of them. I just don't know what the answer is.

[Xena]

Icky, you know it would not surprise me if the let the aged just die. Many cultures do that for sheer survival. It sounds cruel and inhumane, but for a lot of cultures it is a way of life. I believe the eskimo people do that. When the person gets past beting useful and becomes a burden they just wander off to die on their own.

I don't know how a population such as China has could ever deal with that many aged people with so few younger folks to carry the load. I can't see their government stepping in and taking care of them. I just don't know what the answer is.
China has a pretty pragmatic culture. So you may be right.