But the demographic turnaround looks sharp

It is always impressive. After a long row right, chicane, screeching of the brakes, brutal Accelerator output coup. The speed becomes mad. But the driver will soon take a new turn further, the most important race. It slows down to peine It is very impressive when it comes to a formula 1 car. It is even more so when it comes to China in the global economy. China has decided to enter the race, thirty years ago, since multiplied its production by 15 and which became the export world champion last year. China exit deafening the hairpins of the financial crisis, ready now to take the turn to Lewis. Step Lewis Hamilton the racer, but Arthur Lewis, Economist.

In 1979, the leader Deng Xiaoping had launched the Chinese cavalcade by opening the borders. Since then, export fired the country with formidable efficiency. The country is however within this logic. The American consumer can no longer go into debt to buy the "made in China". Resistance is growing in the rest of the world. With these changes, Beijing loose ballast, as it did again last weekend by announcing a softening of its exchange-rate system. The main obstacle, however, is not outside, but inside the country. And it is demographic.

Because the Middle Kingdom has benefited for decades what economist Arthur Lewis called "unlimited offer of work". In 1901, the French Edmond Théry analysed already in these terms the global emergence of China on the economic scene: "violent rupture of the international balance which the social plan of the major industrial nations of Europe is currently established, failure caused by the sudden abnormal and unlimited, a huge new country competition ' (1). For Lewis, specialist development born in 1915 in the still British island of Saint Lucia and the first black to have been honored by the Nobel in 1979, Economist capitalism is built on a seemingly infinite pool of labour ready to work in affecting barely living. These employees, who come by mass campaign, accept to receive less than their production, their "marginal productivity". Occurs then what Marx called "primitive accumulation of capital". However comes a day when the offer becomes limited. The campaigns have more resources. It is turning to Lewis (Lewis Turning Point) at the United Kingdom at the end of the 19th century and profile in China. A symposium was also organized in Beijing in March last on the issue.

When the country takes this turning point, the wage increase. Seen dramatically in Foxconn factories that manufacture the iPhone or the iPad (double of wages) or that of Honda ( 24). Shanghai, the minimum wage is now twice as high as in Hanoi (Viet Nam). Experts predict that the Chinese wages will increase by half in three years. The "turn of Lewis" may seem strange in a country of 1.3 billion people, where the campaigns are still 350 million peasants. But the demographic turnaround looks sharp. By 2015, the workforce will start to decline. The number of 15-24 years old entering the labour market in the next decade is expected to decline 29. It is young people who leave the city. They hesitate more and more to do, reluctance to move away from parents lack of social protection which they are most often only daughter or son.

In 2009, the consumption was less than 50 of GDP in China (against more than 60 in France and 70 in the United States). After a decline continues for more than a decade, this share will now go up. According the World Bank, the consumer will progress faster than investment from 2011. Priority in purchasing power, including revaluing the currency! The most striking is that Beijing working for several years this engine change, this export to use failover. A failover that will disrupt the world economy.