Authorities must go all out to give consumption a boost

At a recent news briefing, the National Development and Reform Commission said that China's household consumption continued to recover in the first half of the year, but there are still problems restricting consumption.

The NDRC said it will work with relevant parties to improve consumption policies, enhance people's consumption capacity, optimize consumption supply, and improve the consumption environment.

Boosting consumption is also related to better meeting people's aspirations for a better life. Since the beginning of this year, a series of measures have been introduced to boost consumption, achieving tangible results. The intensified and targeted policy measures assured by the NDRC and other departments are expected to further boost domestic consumption.

A few days ago, the Ministry of Commerce and many other departments issued a document rolling out a series of measures to boost home consumption, including supporting home facility improvement to adapt to an aging population, and supporting the renovation of old houses. Home consumption covers a variety of products and services such as furniture, household appliances and decoration, thus serving as an important consumption growth point.

To boost household consumption, the authorities must not ignore the idea of raising people's consumption power. This is also why the authorities have repeatedly stressed the need to stabilize employment and increase incomes, properly implement established policy measures to stabilize employment, promote the employment of key groups such as youth, and explore effective ways to increase people's incomes.

Social consumption capacity and income level are the most important factors affecting consumption, while stabilizing employment is the key to raising social consumption capacity and strengthening consumption expectations. To increase consumption capacity, the authorities must revisit old policies. For example, the central bank recently said that commercial banks are supported and encouraged to independently negotiate with borrowers to change the contract agreement, or issue new loans to replace the original stock loans, which is widely being seen as a signal that commercial banks' stock mortgage interest rates may be lowered. Given that lowering stock mortgage interest rates is expected to unleash some people's restricted consumption power, the relevant departments and financial institutions should transmit clearer signals of this kind as soon as possible.

Optimizing consumption supply and improving the consumption environment is a long-term job. The authorities must take multiple measures to improve them to promote consumption.