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Economy

Single Women Drive Growth - A Chinese Economist's Controversial Theory

CHINA TIMES (Taiwan)

Worldcrunch

SHENZHEN – The secret to economic growth? Unmarried women left free to shop, according to one prominent Chinese economist.

Jin Yanshi, who has since become the target of outrage and contempt from colleagues and others, recently laid out his theory that "cities where there are more leftover and divorced women should enjoy a better economy." Jin, who has served as chief economist at Sinolink Securities in Shanghai, also asserts that "men without any power of consumption should be run out of the city", the China Times reported.

Single women, indelicately referred to as leftover women in China, and divorced women contribute to a more vigorous economy, Jin argues, because "women have two natures: they love money and they love to spend it. Women are innate consuming animals."

Jin based his reasoning on the fact that: "Women express their desire in competition. This competition therefore promotes a city's consumption." He then deduced the conclusion that "Men who do not have any power of consumption won't be able to find wives and won't contribute to the city's economy, and thus should be thrown out of town."

The economist's provocative argument immediately triggered a wave of online criticism in China. One attacked his argument saying, "Jin Yanshi has contempt for women's IQ and incites women to compete with each other. He is misleading them to sacrifice their future happiness to boost consumption."

Ma Guangyuan, another famous Chinese economist, simply judged Mr. Jin's theory to be "a joke."

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Society

Marchas Populares, A Great Lisbon Tradition Is Missing Men

The Marchas Populares, Lisbon's summertime carnival parades, are a spectacle of dancing and music — but a shortage of money, free time and men who want to dance are endangering this midsummer tradition.

Image of people dancing, holding hands, in Lisbon, Portugal.

People dancing during the opening of the city festival in Lisbon, capital of Portugal.

Zhang Liyun/Zuma
Ana Narciso and Inês Leote

LISBON — With evictions in the city's “soul” neighborhoods and the aging of residents who have carried on traditions, it sometimes seems that a basic sense of community in Lisbon is fading away.

Nine years shy of their 100th year, Lisbon's traditional Popular Marches — nighttime carnival parades through the city's neighborhoods — are having a hard time finding participants to join the march, especially men.

Meanwhile, just across the river from Lisbon, in nearby municipalities Setúbal and Charneca da Caparica, the solution is to take marchers from one bank to the other.

For many of the participants in this traditional choreography, it no longer matters whether they dance for the neighborhood São Domingos de Benfica, Bica or Campo de Ourique. What they want is to keep going every year, and to save the future of this tradition, which for years has been struggling with a lack of men.

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