China's affluent people longing for others' understanding (03/03/2003)

A number of the emerging affluent in China have got into some troubles, from facing stark charges of tax evasion to extortion by few scoundrels and even occasional murders, and this special group of people are not carefree, as they are often haunted by the "hatred-for-the rich" mentality that has become increasingly evident in certain sectors of society.

Such a mentality is abnormal and unfair to most of these people, according to deputies and members to the imminent annual sessions of the National People's Congress (NPC), China's top legislature, and the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), China's top advisory body.

The affluent people have become better-off through their honest and diligent work with the assistance of pro-business policies of the Chinese government, said Zhang Guoxi, owner of a profitable private enterprise in east China's Jiangxi province and a member of the imminent 10th CPPCC National Committee, on Monday.

They have contributed tremendously to society through providing job opportunities, paying taxes to the state as prescribed by relevant laws and voluntarily offering donations, said Zhang, who was listed as the 42nd wealthiest man in China last year by Forbes magazine of the United States.

Noting that he himself have donated more than 20 million yuan (2.41 million US dollars) to social and public causes in recent years, Zhang encouraged the general public to adopt a correct attitude toward the concept of assets and toward those people who have turned well-to-do first in the country.

"The private entrepreneurs should be taken as fine examples or even models to seek the better-off lives through self-reliance and diligence," said Zhang, who runs a private firm involving from wood carving to tourism and manufacture of electric motors. "That would be facilitate fulfilling China's goal of building a well-off society in an all-round way." The goal was laid down at the 16th Congress of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee held in Nov. last year.

Meanwhile, Zhang Shuguang, a noted researcher with the prestigious Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS), said the people in China should come to recognize that affluent people have not accumulated their assets on the basis of others' financial difficulties. The old notions such as "the rich people being heartless evils" and "robbing the rich to the aid of the needy" are resultant from a kind of abnormal mentality and psychology, he acknowledged.

According to a survey conducted by the United Front Work Department of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee recently, most of the private entrepreneurs had relied merely on a tiny sum of funds to start with. Moreover, more than 90 percent of the private businesses have been hiring laid-off workers from state-owned enterprises, as the survey indicated, and their tax payment has kept growing and the amount of their tax payment is far greater than the profits they have made.

(People's Daily)