Home -> Law Blog Directory -> International Law Blogs -> China Law Blog

International Law

: China Law Blog

China Statistics. Lies And Damn Lies.

By Dan Harris and Steve Dickinson

Excellent post up by my friend Jeremy Gordon over at China Business Services. Post is entitled, "Statistics That Don't Add Up," and it is on the notorious unreliability of Chinese economic statistics. Where it excels is in breaking down and recalculating the numbers and in giving us a Goldman Sachs roadmap on determining reliability. The post is based on an Economist article, entitled, "An aberrant Abacus," which posits that China has actually been underestimating its economic growth over the last few years. The article also puts forth the following "guide (developed by Goldman Sachs) to the reliability of official Chinese number" by ranking the reliability of Chinese government stats from 1-5, with 5 being the most reliable: ? Foreign Trade: 5 ? Money Supply: 5 ? Industrial production: 4 ? Consumer Prices: 4 ? GDP: 3 ? Retail Sales: 3 ? Fixed Investment: 2 ? Employment: 2 ? Average Earnings: 1 ? Unemployment: 1 Seems like the accuracy declines the more the numbers might affect the CCP's position with its own people. What do you think?

Full post as published by China Law Blog on May 11, 2008 (boomark / email).