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New norm to better reflect income gap

By Hu Yang (chinadaily.com.cn)
Updated: 2010-06-09 15:12

China's National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) will reform the standards in compiling statistics for urban and rural personal incomes, in a bid to better reflect the income gap between cities and villages, the 21st Century Business Herald reported on Wednesday.

The new norm will adopt "per capita disposable income" to replace the current "per capita net income" for rural residents; and longtime migrant workers' income will be attributed to the city where he or she works, instead of being accounted to the hometown village.

"Per capita disposable income," which has already been used for urban residents' income statistics, refers to the total income minus personal income tax, housing fund, pension insurance and medical insurance.

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"With the same statistics norm, urban and rural incomes can be directly compared, and the accuracy of income gap will greatly improve," said Wang Pingping, deputy director of NBS's Department of Rural Social and Economic Survey.

Wang further points out that although putting longtime migrant workers' income into the city category will lower the disposable income in rural areas, it will also lower urban areas' disposable income.

Zhao Renwei, an expert with the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, said the incomes of migrant workers can make a significant difference in the urban and rural income gap, and he said counting them separately might also be a solution.