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China 's One Child Policy : Destructive Or Constructive?

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China’s One-Child Policy: Destructive or Constructive?
Classical Argument Essay
China’s one-child policy has created a wide range of debates as to whether it is helpful or detrimental to the country due to the conditions it holds. In 1978, China discussed a law stating married couples could only have one child within their lifetime. This policy was eventually applied a couple years later, in 1980, after they discussed the various terms of the policy. After several years of action, China added flexibility to this law, allowing families to have another child after five years as long as their first child is female. The one-child policy was originally enacted as a temporary solution to control the bursting population of the country, however…show more content…
Li and Zhang state, “the one-child policy may indeed have contributed to the rapid growth of the Chinese economy since the late 1970s”, after conducting their study (Li and Zhang 116). If China’s population had grown at the rate that it was before the 1980s, it is highly possible that the country would have ended up crashing in production with little people actually living the comfortable lives that they do now. While the population is still growing, it is not at as rapid of a rate as years previous to the policy. Li and Zhang find, “Shanghai achieved a birth rate as low as 0.6% in the period 1993–1998” (Li and Zhang 112), showing that even highly populated areas can keep growth under control when certain conditions are met. Li and Zhang state the reduction in birth rate has made the biggest contribution as it has affected more than just the population.
With less people inhabiting the country, unemployment has dropped significantly. Cheap labor has resulted in a surplus of jobs being offered because the country can afford to pay a lot more people. Due to citizens being willing to work cheaply, the country they live in is more inclined to offer multiple positions to people searching for an occupation. This results in less people going without jobs. Nakra states, “Economists project that in the next 20 years the working-age group will fall in China by around 100 million people” (Nakra 137), with the policy there will be plenty of jobs available. With less children in the
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