Communist China Relaxes Urban Hukou Restriction

It’s reported on July 12th, the Communist China’s National Development and Reform Commission issued a notification named “The Fourteenth Five-year Plan” on New Urbanization, which comprehensively relaxed conditions for settlement in I-type large city with a permanent urban population of 3 million to 5 million.

Under the Chinese Communist Party (CCP)’s rule rural agricultural household hold different residence status as urban resident, and this is called hukou system. In the reform of hukou system, the plan intent to relax limitations on rural hukou to become urban ones except in some special megacities, and attempt to allow people to settle their hukou in the place they usually live. It will reduce the restrictions on obtaining a hukou in cities with population less than 3 million, to ensure the non-local and local rural hukou residents are treated equally. The plan also noted to further relax conditions for settlement in I-type large city with a permanent urban population of 3 million to 5 million, and improve the hukou policy of super and mega cities with a permanent population over 5 million in urban areas. The plan encouraged local authorities to remove annual hukou quota.

In the end of 2021, the urban population portion in Communist China has reached 64.72%, and 46.7% of its population live in towns or smaller cities. The Communist regime rolled out planned economy, family planning, and population planning, all of which are determined by a group of dictators. The CCP’s hukou is significantly more stringent than the Baojia system (a military-style population control system) in ancient China, which divides the population by regions and manages the people with a type of restricting activities to a designated area, and nobody can escape from the CCP’s manipulation and control.

Judging from the plan to encourage rural residents to settle in cities, it is estimated that urban population has decreased greatly, which could contribute to the decline of economy, forcing the regime to recruit more urban residents to keep the rulership running.