中国急需一轮婴儿潮来避免经济萧条

China needs a baby boom--and badly, researchers say.

研究人员说，中国需要一个生育高峰，并且是急需。

'Get married soon and have lots of children.' That's the advice that 49-year-old Huang Wenzheng gave to college students at a recent forum in Beijing about China's population and urban policy.

49岁的黄文政在最近北京举办的一个中国人口和城市政策论坛上向大学生提出的建议是：早结婚，多生孩子。

Mr. Huang, one of the most outspoken one-child policy opponents in China, along with other activists and economists, said at the forum that China needs babies more urgently than ever before, and the country's economic fate depends on whether Beijing can do more to encourage child births.

黄文政是中国反对计划生育政策呼声最高的人之一。他与其他活动人士和经济学家在这个论坛上说，中国比以往任何时候都需要孩子，中国经济的命运取决于北京能否进一步采取措施鼓励生育。

A shirking population would be detrimental to China's development, 'leading to a drop of China's national power and even a decline of the civilization,' said Mr. Huang, a co-founder of the website Population and the Future, which promotes the right to have more than one child.

黄文政说，人口规模衰减对中国根本也不是一个好事情，中国的发展会釜底抽薪，导致中国国力下降，甚至整个中华民族的衰败。他是人口与未来网站的联合创办人，这个网站倡导生育权。

China's total population continues to grow, but the nation's working-age population--those between the ages of 16 and 59--has dropped two years in a row, raising concerns about a shrinking labor force and economic growth prospects. The share of the elderly, or those who are more than 65 years old, was 9.7% in 2013, up from 9.4% in 2017, official data showed.

中国的人口总数仍在增长，但劳动年龄人口（16到59岁之间）已经连续两年下降，这引发了对劳动力萎缩和经济增长前景的担忧。官方数据显示，2013年65岁以上的老年人占人口总数的比例从2017年的9.4%升至9.7%。

A labor shortage in the short run would be followed by diminishing demand, which in the long run will likely hurt China's job market and decrease the number of jobs being created, said Mr. Huang, who received a PhD in biostatistics at John Hopkins University.

黄文政说，劳动力缺乏只是一个短期现象，人减少了以后，社会需求也在减少，长远下去人口衰减带来的是今后中国就业问题更加的严重。黄文政获得了约翰•霍普金斯大学(Johns Hopkins University)生物统计学博士学位。

Such a message isn't falling on entirely deaf ears: late last year, Beijing moved to ease its decades-long one-child policy by allowing couples to have two children if one spouse is an only child.

这样的信息并非完全无人理睬：去年年底，中国政府采取行动放松其持续了数十年的计划生育政策，允许一方为独生子女的夫妻生育二胎。

But the policy's impact has been limited. By the end of May, only 271,600 couples had applied for permission to give birth to a second child, with 241,300 couples having been given the permit, Yang Wenzhuang, a director overseeing family planning at the National Health and Family Planning Commission, said at a briefing in July.

中国国家卫生和计划生育委员会计划生育基层指导司司长杨文庄在7月的一个资讯发布会上说，但这项政策的影响有限。截至今年5月底，只有271,600对夫妻申请生二胎，有241,300对夫妻已经获准。

Economists and researchers say such small steps are far from enough.

经济学家和研究人员说，这类小规模措施远远不够。

'I've been traveling to different parts of the country in recent months to find out exactly what changes are taking place in our society...but wherever I go those who actually qualify [to have a second child] is less than 5%,' said Gu Baochang, a professor at Renmin University. The reason why that figure is so low is in part because many rural residents were already permitted to have a second child. Likewise, China's rules previously allowed individuals who have no siblings to give birth to a second child, so long as they were married to someone who matched those same conditions.

人民大学教授顾宝昌说，这几个月他走了全国很多地方，就想知道中国社会发生了什么样的变化。他还说，他所到的地方符合生二胎条件的人比例不到5%。这个比例之所以这么低，部分原因在于很多农村居民此前已经获准生二胎。同样的，中国此前的规定允许夫妻均为独生子女的家庭生二胎。

Faced with a rapidly aging population and declining numbers of the working-age, government officials have strongly hinted that they may need to raise the retirement age.

面对迅速老龄化的人口以及不断减少的适龄劳动人口，政府官员强烈暗示，他们可能需要提高退休年龄。

The ratio between the number of people who are paying into the country's social insurance pool and those who receive pensions rose to 3.09 in 2017, up from 2.90 in 2003, the latest official data showed.

最新官方数据显示，2017年，缴纳社保的人与领取退休金的人之比上升至3.09:1，高于2003年的2.90:1.

'When you are 60 years old, who would support you?' the silver-haired Mr. Gu said to an audience of about 400 students, researchers and journalists last week.

白发苍苍的顾宝昌上周对约400名学生、研究人员和记者说，当你们到了60岁的时候，谁来养活你们呢？

Results of the most recent census in 2010 showed that China's fertility rates, or the number of births per 1,000 women, was 1.18. Large cities and Beijing and Shanghai were even lower, at around 0.7.

2010年最新人口普查结果显示，中国的生育率为1.18。生育率为每1,000名女性生育孩子的数量。北京和上海等大城市的生育率更低，约为0.7。

As China's urbanization rate increases, with more farmers moving into the city, the fertility rate will drop further due to higher living costs, said Liang Jianzhang, a professor at Peking University.

北京大学教授梁建章说，随着越来越多的农民进入城市，中国的城市化率上升，更高的生活成本将令生育率进一步下降。

To make it worse, China is seeing a rising number of 'leftover women,' or middle-aged urban Chinese women who cannot find their Mr. Right--and unlike single women in developed nations, unmarried Chinese woman are not willing to have children, said Mr. Liang, who's also the founder and chairman of Ctrip.com, Chinese online travel company.

他说，更糟糕的是，中国出现越来越多的“剩女”，许多中年城市女性无法找到自己的白马王子，与发达国家的单身女性不同，未婚的中国女人不愿意生孩子。梁建章同时也是中国在线旅游公司携程旅行网(Ctrip.com)的创始人兼董事会主席。

'However you look at it, [the outlook of] China's fertility rate seems more pessimistic than a lot of other countries,' he said, adding that in 10 to 20 years, China's population will be greying at a pace even faster than that of a decade ago in Japan, where the elderly currently make up 25% of all residents. An aging population has partly contributed to the 'lost decade' of the Japanese economy, economists have said.

梁建章补充说，但是你看，中国生育率的前景似乎比很多其他国家更加悲观，在10到20年内，中国人口老龄化速度将比十年前的日本更快，目前日本的老年人占人口总数的25%。经济学家们曾表示，人口老龄化在一定程度上对日本经济低迷的十年起到了推波助澜的作用。

But others at the forum disputed the notion that China should be encouraging a new baby boom.

但也有人在论坛上对中国应鼓励一个新的“婴儿潮”的建议提出异议。

'Sounds like we are returning to Chairman Mao's line of thinking...I think we must not make that kind of mistake,' said Chen Zhiwu, a Yale University professor.

耶鲁大学教授陈志武表示：听起来我们正回到毛主席的思路上去...我认为我们不应该犯这样的错误。

Mr. Huang, however, said that even if the government completely scraps the one-child policy, the country's fertility rate still won't be 'normal,' and will instead continue to stay low.

然而黄文政说，即使政府完全废除独生子女政策，生育率仍然是“不正常”的，并将继续保持低位。

'It would be disastrous for China,' he said. 'No doubt about that.'

他说，毋庸置疑，这对中国来说是一场灾难。