Question

Why did peasants' income increase in 1980s?

The Chinese Economy

Answer 1

One of the most important aspects of the country's shift to a capitalist economy was the decollectivisation of China's rural economy in the early 1980s. Deng Xiaoping hailed it as an "innovation," and its importance for the whole cycle of capitalist-oriented "reform" can not possibly be overestimated. The Chinese government has repeatedly referred to the supposed economic benefits of decollectivization as "growing opportunities to millions of peasants significantly."

Nevertheless, the decollectivization's political-economic implications have always been highly ambiguous, and at best doubtful. Person or small groups of peasants were often depicted as political stars for initiating the process in media accounts, but this helped to mask the strong opposition to de-collectivization in many localities. Moreover, most of the writings downplay the deeper causes and consequences of the agrarian reform, leaving the illusion that the rural reform was politically neutral at its heart.

While the Cadres failed to buy support from the workers for the reform, they were popular with the peasants. Over the transition period (1979–1984), the income of the peasants increased significantly due mainly to higher prices of procurements. Propaganda attributed decollectivisation to this achievement. Most peasants therefore had positive views on the rural reforms, at least at the beginning.

The temporary increase in rural incomes convinced most farmers to support further reforms. There was also the long-term effect of supplying an almost limitless supply of labor to private industries in urban areas, as the CCP allowed individual peasants to sell their labor power in the city after the agrarian reform. The glut of urban labor significantly eroded the influence of the old working class in publicly owned undertakings. It was under these circumstances that further urban development was made possible, including the mass unemployment.