I have chosen to research China for the rest of our course. I chose China specifically because of their high rate of mental illnesses. Although I have not yet picked a specific illness to focus on, I do know that they have the highest rates of mental illness in the world, in which I wanted to focus in on.
As we all know, China holds the largest population of people in the world, with about 1,390.08M people residing within these borders. About 57.96% of this population reside in urban areas, including cities. These numbers are expected to grow about .3% every year up until 2030. This fact is not surprising considering, in 2017 alone, there were about 17.86M births that year. Considering how many people reside in China, it is surprising to find out that these people do not have much money, as China’s GDP per capita is about 8,677 U.S dollars. Although their unemployment rate is only around 3.9%, the amount of people that are under the U.S. poverty line, paid under $1.25 an hour, is still about 11.8%.
In China, education is very important to their people as they have one of the largest education systems in the world. Children here have a required minimum of 9 years of education, which 99% of students complete. With this fact in mind, it did not surprise me that 9.75 million students took the National Higher Education Entrance Examination to further their education in China.
The number of women currently living in China compared to men is significantly lower. One example of this great difference was in 2016 when there was a surplus of marriageable men who were between the ages of 20-24, that number was about 110-100. This weird difference in men and women was due to the one child rule China held for many years. Due to this rule, many people only wanted sons, so if they were to expect a female child they would get rid of it to make room for a son. Although women are seen as the population that needs to stay at home rather than go to work like men, their unemployment rate is still much lower than mens unemployment rate.
During my time researching China and learning its data, I have learned so much more than I would have thought. When actually going out of your way and researching other countries, it would surprise you how much the media does not tell you. I believe China’s unemployment rate for women compared to men shocked me the most as it is tradition in China’s culture that the women stays at home and takes care of her family. This being said, I can not wait for all of the new information that I will learn about China during the rest of this course.
Works Cited:
Jaaskelainen, Liisa. “Topic: China.” Www.statista.com, www.statista.com/topics/753/china/.
“Statistics.” UNICEF, 24 Dec. 2013, www.unicef.org/infobycountry/china_statistics.html.
Www.chinaeducenter.com. “China Education.” Overview of Education in China – China Education Center, www.chinaeducenter.com/en/cedu.php.