On Mon, 22 Oct 2007 15:09:48 GMT, "David Lloyd"
<
[email protected]> wrote:
>
>"Tom Crispin" <[email protected]> wrote in message
>news:[email protected]...
>> On Sat, 20 Oct 2007 12:32:30 GMT, "David Lloyd"
>> <[email protected]> wrote:
>>
>>>
>>><[email protected]> wrote in message
>>>news:[email protected]...
>>>> 2008 Olympic China Beijing Hotel Standard Apartment,Villa Reservation
>>>> Center
>>>>
>>><Spam snipped>
>>>
>>>Did anyone else see 'Unreported World' last night? Many people in Beijing
>>>have been evicted from their homes to make way for such apartments, and
>>>for
>>>the Olympics themselves. The compensation that they were offered was
>>>derisory, not enough to buy a new home. Many are ending up on the streets
>>>or, when they try to complain to the authorities, they are imprisoned in
>>>illegal black jails. If they try to stand up against developers, they are
>>>beaten by hired thugs and intimidated by the police.
>>
>> I expect those evicted and/or beaten up were migrant workers, not
>> Beijing residents.
>>
>> AFAIK Beijing residents whose abode is up for redevelopment are
>> entitled to be rehoused in a property of at least the same size,
>> though the location may be less than convienient.
>>
>> Migrant workers will most likely have their home on a commune, perhaps
>> the other side of the country, and have no entitlement to live in
>> Beijing.
>
>When is a resident not a resident? The Chinese economy is sucking people
>into Beijing just like the industrial revolution sucked people into cities
>in the UK. These people had proper homes from which they were turfed out.
The Western economy is sucking people into Western societies from
across the developing world. Although those imigrants contribute, or
indeed are the driving force, behind western economies, they have no
automatic right of citizenship in the host country.
In the same way, Chinese peasants sucked into the cities have no
automatic right to residency staus in the host city.
A city, like Shanghai, if it accepted all and sundry, would not be
able to adequately support its permanent residents. It accepts
migrant workers, but they have no right to state accommodation,
healthcare or education.
However, it's not all bad for the migrant workers. They have no right
to buy or sell land in their home state, but they do rent their plots
of land to their neigbours giving them a modest but welcome source of
unearned income.
My brother lives in Shanghai with his Chinese wife. They have a maid
who is a migrant worker. Her husband stays at home, about 800Km away,
and he farms six plots of land. Together they have been able to put
their son through university education. He now works for an Italian
telecoms compnay and has managed to get city residency status.
Presumably he'll be able to support his parents sometime in the
future. Meanwhile, my brother's maid is investing her surplus income
in the Shanghai stock market.
Incidently, when my brother's wife had a second child they had a tough
time getting him Shanghai Residency staus. It cost them something in
the region of £3,000 in fines. He writes about it here:
www.cbiz.cn/news/showarticle.asp?id=2223