Text/Chen Haoxing
5.3%! China's economic "report card" for the first quarter was released on the morning of 16 July.
China News Service held the "Guoshi Forum: Analysis of the Economic Situation in the First Quarter of 2024", inviting 6 experts to take you to understand this report card from macro, employment, consumption, foreign trade, real estate and other fields!
Enterprises are actively recruiting, and there is a strong demand for talents in fields such as artificial intelligence
Jin Weigang, vice president of the Institute of National System of Zhejiang University, is a through train photo by Zhao Bin
In the first quarter, the average surveyed unemployment rate in urban areas nationwide was 5.2 percent, down 0.3 percentage points from the same period last year.
Jin Weigang, vice president of the National System Research Institute of Zhejiang University, said that according to the big data analysis of the National Human Resources Market Information Monitoring Center, during the "Spring Breeze Action" this year, the manufacturing industry is still the main source of employment, and the recruitment demand accounts for more than 30% of the recruitment positions provided by the national job market.
He believes that from the perspective of enterprises, the recruitment demand of small and micro enterprises has increased significantly, and the demand for technical skills has also grown rapidly. "The current situation in the employment field reflects the gradual stabilization and recovery of China's economy, and the trend of further consolidation. ”
Jin Weigang also reminded that the current pressure on employment is still great, especially the structural contradictions. This year, the total number of college graduates has reached a record high, and there are some difficult groups in the entire job market that still need corresponding support from the government. This year's employment work will give priority to employment, make every effort to stabilize jobs, expand employment channels, improve employment skills, optimize employment services, and ensure that key groups are guaranteed.
The support of new industries and new drivers for the economy has been significantly enhanced
Guo Liyan, deputy director of the Economic Research Institute of the China Academy of Macroeconomics, is a through train photo by Zhao Bin
According to the official preliminary calculation, the GDP in the first quarter was 296299 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 5.3 percent at constant prices, and a quarter-on-quarter increase of 1.6 percent over the fourth quarter of last year.
"While achieving a reasonable increase in quantity, the effective improvement of quality is particularly noteworthy. Guo Liyan, deputy director of the Economic Research Institute of the Chinese Academy of Macroeconomics, said that the support of new industries and new kinetic energy has been significantly enhanced. In the first quarter, the added value of high-tech manufacturing increased by 7.5 percent, 1.4 percentage points faster than the added value of industrial enterprises above designated size in the same period. At the same time, in the field of manufacturing, the added value of the equipment manufacturing industry with a long industrial chain and high added value also maintained a high growth rate.
"At present, in the field of manufacturing, the investment in more high-end, green and intelligent transformation and upgrading is constantly increasing, which also marks our efforts to promote the accelerated growth of new kinetic energy. Guo Liyan said.
According to the National Bureau of Statistics, in the first quarter, the total retail sales of consumer goods 120327 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 4.7%. Guo Liyan noted that in the same period, the retail sales of services increased by 10.0% year-on-year, which is very close to the actual consumption of households since the beginning of this year, and is also the characteristic of consumption in the first quarter of this year.
"Looking forward to the future from the present, it depicts the upgrading and change of China's consumption structure. Guo Liyan believes that with the increase in per capita income level and the upgrading of the entire consumer demand structure, the proportion of service consumption in the entire consumer expenditure will grow steadily.
High-frequency data continues to improve, and the popularity of home appliance replacement is high
Yang Daoling, Director of the Big Data Analysis Division of the Big Data Development Department of the State Information Center, photo by Zhao Bin
High-frequency data is another important perspective for observing the performance of the economy. Yang Daoling, director of the Big Data Analysis Division of the Big Data Development Department of the State Information Center, said that in the first quarter of this year, a number of high-frequency indicators in terms of investment, consumption, foreign trade and enterprise production and operation vitality continued to improve, indicating that the mainland's economy has made simultaneous efforts with multiple engines to achieve a good start.
Yang Daoling said that "popularity" is the most intuitive perspective to observe the vitality of consumption, and the heat index of the flow of people in offline business districts increased by 9.9% in the first quarter compared with the same period last year, of which it increased by 17.7% in March.
The consumption of life services is the type of consumption that is most suitable for people's livelihood. The heat index of life service consumption, which is constructed based on the consumption order data of life service e-commerce platforms, increased by more than 30% year-on-year in the first quarter, indicating that the vitality of life service consumption field, which is most closely related to residents, continues to improve.
Yang Daoling specifically mentioned that with the gradual implementation of the "old for new" policy of various household appliances, the demand for new household appliances is expected to be further released, and the consumer market for household appliances will continue to grow steadily. Since late February, the average daily Internet attention of household appliances "trade-in" has increased by 10 times compared with before, and the index reached a peak in the first quarter in late March, and it is still at a high level. At the same time, since March, the search popularity index of "trade-in" has jumped rapidly, with a significant increase of 260% over the previous year.
This year, the negative factors of exports have weakened
Zhang Yuguo, director of the International Economic and Trade Research Office of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences' Institute of Financial and Economic Strategy, is a direct train photo by Zhao Bin
In the first quarter, the scale of China's imports and exports exceeded 10 trillion yuan for the first time in the same period in history, and the growth rate of imports and exports hit a new high in six quarters. Zhang Yu, director of the International Economic and Trade Research Office of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences' Institute of Financial and Economic Strategy, said that China's import and export trade picked up in the first quarter, and the trend of upgrading was further maintained.
For example, in the first quarter, the export of mechanical and electrical products, especially some ship products, grew very fast. Since last year, the "new three" has played an important role in supporting China's exports, and this year, mechanical and electrical products still play an important role in exports. Exports of labor-intensive products also increased significantly in the first quarter. This shows that the processes and processes of labor-intensive product production are adjusting with technological progress.
At the same time, China's foreign trade continues to explore emerging markets, the role of private enterprises in the development of foreign trade is becoming more and more prominent, and new forms of trade have gradually become a new support for China's trade.
Zhang Yu believes that last year's pressure on China's foreign trade was largely due to some geopolitical risks, and there will be some changes this year. For example, the U.S. push for "decoupling" has not brought substantial benefits, but has caused more serious inflationary pressures in the country, and some investment projects related to the future development of its country, such as 5G infrastructure, photovoltaics, and new energy, have also encountered obstacles. In this context, the negative factors that affected China's exports last year are expected to weaken this year.
The economic performance in the first quarter strengthened confidence in achieving the full-year target
Zong Liangguo, chief researcher of the Bank of China, is a through train photo by Zhao Bin
China's economic growth target for 2024 is "around 5%". Zong Liang, chief researcher at the Bank of China, believes that the growth rate in the first quarter reached 5.3%, which strengthened the confidence in achieving the full-year target.
He said that this year-on-year growth rate was higher than the market consensus expectation, consolidating the positive momentum of economic recovery. From a global perspective, this is also a "very high growth rate" and is in line with the potential growth rate of China's economy in the next few years.
China's economy got off to a good start in the first quarter, but Zong Liang reminded that it is necessary to pay attention to its sustainability and have sustained policies to ensure the high-quality realization of the annual target. Among them, including speeding up the implementation of fiscal policies and improving the quality and efficiency of the use of funds, the policies that should be implemented should be implemented as soon as possible to ensure that funds are in place as soon as possible, and the relevant bond issuance should also be issued; multiple measures should be taken to implement financial policies, pay attention to the rhythm of overseas central banks, especially pay close attention to the Fed's trends; dig deep into the growth space of consumption and investment, increase the expansion of domestic demand, and a new round of trade-in of consumer goods will have a positive significance for stimulating economic growth.
Zong Liang also mentioned that it is necessary to properly respond to the impact of the evolution of the international economic pattern and help foreign trade enterprises to operate steadily, to create an "investment treasure land", formulate a series of specific business environment assessment indicators, pay attention to strengthening policy coordination, and reserve appropriate space. "China is a big country, and the coordination of various policies is very meaningful. ”
Zhao Bo: Real estate stability is crucial or needs to be strengthened
Zhao Bo, tenured associate professor of economics at the National School of Development of Peking University, photo by Zhao Bin
Talking about the real estate sector, Zhao Bo, a tenured associate professor of economics at Peking University's National School of Development, believes that in general, the financing of real estate companies has improved, but the demand for housing has not fully recovered, and a larger policy stimulus may be needed.
In his view, real estate plays a vital role in investment and is one of the main sources of extra-budgetary revenue for local governments. Therefore, the stability of the real estate market is crucial.
Zhao Bo mentioned that at present, the state has adopted a series of policies to deal with the challenges, launched policies such as guaranteeing the delivery of buildings and bailing out funds, and emphasized the need to treat all types of ownership entities equally, and at the same time launched a "white list" system for real estate projects.
As for increasing consumption, Zhao Bo believes that the key depends on three aspects: first, to increase the disposable income of residents, especially the long-term income that residents can stabilize expectations; second, to let the people dare to spend money and have security, and to improve the social income guarantee; third, to improve the capital market and repair residents' balance sheets.
He believes that if people no longer worry about their income risks, pension risks, expensive medical treatments, and difficult school risks, savings will be reduced, and consumer confidence will be improved. "We should further increase the overall planning of social security, so that residents everywhere can truly and equally access the benefits of social security. ”
Source: The country is a through train
Editor: Qin Jing
Editor-in-charge: Wei Xi