Whichever way one looks at it, Xi Jinping’s announcement that China has abolished absolute poverty is an epochal event. From being one of the poorest societies on earth, and accounting along with India for the overwhelming bulk of the world’s absolute poor, China has now reached a level of per capita income that is close to the global average (measured using purchasing power parity, or PPP). And it has raised a claimed 850 million people out of poverty.
As with all Chinese statistics, there is some quibble about the numbers. China uses as its benchmark a basic World Bank-prescribed
As with all Chinese statistics, there is some quibble about the numbers. China uses as its benchmark a basic World Bank-prescribed
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