In recent years and especially in 2021, new, strict regulations promulgated by the Chinese government have hammered a number of industries, such as education, e-commerce, real estate and even entertainment. These policy changes have proven detrimental to the short-term growth of the for-profit supplemental education industry, and are likely to have profound consequences for the Chinese economy and society in general. This presentation draws on these policy changes to review current conditions in China’s education, market and state sectors.

Speakers:

Xiaojun Wang is an Associate Professor of Economics at UHM. His main research interests fall into the broad field of labor economics, and recently have focused on labor market transitions during China’s reform era. He has published articles in the Review of Economics and Statistics, Journal of Development Economics, Economic Inquiry, Journal of Comparative Economics, Economics of Education Review, and China Economic Review. He received his BA/MA degrees in international economics from Wuhan U., and MA/PHD degrees in economics from OSU.

Le Lin is an Assistant Professor of Sociology at UHM. He studies how China’s market capitalism evolves, interacts with the state and the global capital market, and shapes formerly socialist public goods such as education and medicine. His book When Opportunists Produce (U. Chicago Press, 2022) examines the privatization and marketization of China’s supplemental education industry. His award-winning papers have appeared in journals such as Socio-Economic Review. He holds a B.A. in Economics from Zhejiang U., an M.A. in Education from Columbia U. and an M.A. and a Ph.D. in Sociology from the U. of Chicago.

Co-sponsors:

UH Department of Economics

UH Department of Sociology