Report: The epidemic has had a great impact on the tertiary industry, and education has become the most worrying problem for the people for the first time

In 2020, under the impact of the new crown epidemic, the China Development Index, which has been released for 16 years, reached an all-time high, but the growth rate was record low. The epidemic has posed new challenges to the mainland's ability to respond to sudden problems encountered in development.

The China Development Index Annual Report (2021) recently released by the China Survey and Data Center of Chinese Min University shows that the growth rate of China's total social development index has slowed down, and some indicators have declined compared with the previous year. But overall, health, education, living standards continue to improve, people's living standards and quality of life continue to improve.

The survey results also show that for the first time, education has become the first of the top ten problems that the surveyed people are worried about; the problems of medical treatment and housing have eased, and people's confidence in education is also growing.

The impact of the epidemic on the tertiary industry is relatively large

The China Development Index consists of four sub-indexes (health index, education index, living standard index, and social environment index).

Of the 15 monitoring indicators, 10 were positive growth, 8 were faster than the overall index growth and 5 were negative. Among the positive growth indicators, the per capita net income of rural residents increased by 17.37, which is much higher than the growth rate of per capita GDP (1.83).

Among the indicators of negative growth, the proportion of added value of the tertiary industry to GDP fell by 12.91. This reflects the greater impact of the COVID-19 epidemic on the tertiary industry, while the large decline in the registered unemployment rate in cities and towns and the Engel coefficient of urban residents also reflects the negative impact of the COVID-19 epidemic on the employment environment and quality of life. Rising unemployment and rising share of food consumption have adversely affected living standards and the social environment.

The report also shows that the epidemic in 2020 has a greater impact on the living standard index, with 11 provinces with negative per capita GDP growth; the Engel coefficient of urban residents is only positive growth in two provinces; but the consumption ratio of urban and rural residents and the per capita net income of rural residents, which reflect the living standards of rural residents, show a good growth trend, and only one province of the two indicators has negative growth. This reflects the trend of continuous growth in the income and living standards of rural residents.

From a sub-regional point of view, the China Development Index RCDI (2021) regional total index is still led by developed regions, and the degree of development of other regions is relatively balanced. The total index scores of Beijing, Shanghai, Zhejiang, Jiangsu and Tianjin are in the first echelon.

Judging from the rankings of provinces by index, Beijing, Shanghai and other economically developed areas ranked relatively high in the sub-index of health, education and living standards, and the social environment index of western provinces ranked higher.

For the first time, education became the biggest concern of the population

The report shows that China's development confidence in 2021 increased significantly compared with the previous year, reaching the highest value of 93.4 points in the ten years since the survey was conducted.

The top three issues listed by respondents were education (13.6%, up 1.6 percentage points from 2020), medical treatment (12.2%, down 1.5 percentage points from 2020) and housing (10.1%, down 2.5 percentage points from 2019).

Among them, medical treatment and housing have ranked in the top three for eight consecutive years, which are two major problems related to people's livelihood. In this year's report, the proportion of these two problems has declined, indicating that the mainland's medical security and medical construction have begun to improve, the regional medical level has gradually improved, and the people have more opportunities to contact high-quality medical services.

Education is a major focus this year and for the first time since the survey, it has become the biggest concern for the public. On the one hand, a number of education policies have been introduced in 2021, especially the education double reduction policy, which has increased the public's attention to education; on the other hand, the pressure to go to school still exists. More relevant initiatives may be needed to be gradually improved in the future.

Peng Fei, deputy director of the China Survey and Data Center of Chinese University and professor at the School of Statistics of Renmin University, said that in the survey of confidence in China's development, the three major issues that the public is most worried about, education, ranked first for the first time; medical treatment and housing ranked second. This reflects that the education reform in 2021 has reached thousands of households; everyone is still waiting to see the effectiveness and sustainability of the new education initiatives. At the same time, a series of educational reforms represented by "double reduction" have been implemented in 2021, and all aspects of society also need a process of adaptation to this.

According to the report, education reform is a major theme in 2021, and the survey shows that people have mixed evaluations of the various education policies promulgated in 2021, but still express confidence in the future education reform. Education policy is linked to all aspects of people's livelihood such as fertility and employment, and will be the focus of development for a long time in the future.