I will be moving on to another blog page in order have easy access from mainland China. Please check out kinesenikina.blogg.se for further updates.
Best wishes in the Tiger year!
/Y
söndag 7 mars 2010
onsdag 16 september 2009
Shanghai Stories VII - Secondary markets
Having been here for over a month now, I have come across some practices that I didn't expect. One phenomenon is the what I would like to dub "Secondary markets" and give 2 examples of what I think is extraordinary creativity and a evidence of how markets evolve and self regulate seemingly without interference.
A common way of tax evasion of reduction in China is for companies to pay some of their salaries as a form of living expenses. They require their employees to give in a certain amount of receipts from taxi, public transportation, or restaurants, sometimes up to 50% of their salary. Companies may then use these to claim tax deductions. Of course this is bad for employees since many of their other benefits which are based on base salary will be lower as well. This problem aside, it has created a demand for receipts that people need to provide for their employers. People help their friends collecting these "money vouchers" so that they can get their salaries. The ones with high face value are more in demand since they are easier to fil, Although taxi receipts of 20 RMB sometimes have to make do. Basically, a large portion of the society is helping out to fool the tax authorities. I have only heard about people being inconvenienced but nobody has ever raised any moral or legal objections.
All is not doom and gloom for Chinese workers. Many jobs, especially public sector ones, come with substantial benefits. They come as vouchers for supermarkets or malls or even food products such as moon cakes (moon festival is 3rd Oct). Many people may have too many for their own consumption and may then sell them at a discount to dealers (e.g. 10%) who pass them on (at e.g. 95%) to earn the difference. The dealers abound in busy commercial districts, some surely acting in larger groups to reduce risk. This is not entirely without risk as vouchers for moon cakes will be worthless after the moon festival (much like pumpkins after halloween). The fascinating is that markets emerged spontaneously. This is not controlled, encouraged or regulated, yet it thrives thanks to the provision of vouchers. I guess this is a remnant from the rationing era when people dealt in vouchers for rice and oil.
In conclusion, supplies will always find demand given a flexible infrastructure. In other countries with sufficient infrastructure, websites as eBay have filled this infrastructure gap. In China, not enough people are able to use these sites, especially older people who get most vouchers thanks to their seniority. This has opened up an opportunity for dealers to create this market. In China, there is always a way but it might not be the straightest.
Until next time.
/Y
A common way of tax evasion of reduction in China is for companies to pay some of their salaries as a form of living expenses. They require their employees to give in a certain amount of receipts from taxi, public transportation, or restaurants, sometimes up to 50% of their salary. Companies may then use these to claim tax deductions. Of course this is bad for employees since many of their other benefits which are based on base salary will be lower as well. This problem aside, it has created a demand for receipts that people need to provide for their employers. People help their friends collecting these "money vouchers" so that they can get their salaries. The ones with high face value are more in demand since they are easier to fil, Although taxi receipts of 20 RMB sometimes have to make do. Basically, a large portion of the society is helping out to fool the tax authorities. I have only heard about people being inconvenienced but nobody has ever raised any moral or legal objections.
All is not doom and gloom for Chinese workers. Many jobs, especially public sector ones, come with substantial benefits. They come as vouchers for supermarkets or malls or even food products such as moon cakes (moon festival is 3rd Oct). Many people may have too many for their own consumption and may then sell them at a discount to dealers (e.g. 10%) who pass them on (at e.g. 95%) to earn the difference. The dealers abound in busy commercial districts, some surely acting in larger groups to reduce risk. This is not entirely without risk as vouchers for moon cakes will be worthless after the moon festival (much like pumpkins after halloween). The fascinating is that markets emerged spontaneously. This is not controlled, encouraged or regulated, yet it thrives thanks to the provision of vouchers. I guess this is a remnant from the rationing era when people dealt in vouchers for rice and oil.
In conclusion, supplies will always find demand given a flexible infrastructure. In other countries with sufficient infrastructure, websites as eBay have filled this infrastructure gap. In China, not enough people are able to use these sites, especially older people who get most vouchers thanks to their seniority. This has opened up an opportunity for dealers to create this market. In China, there is always a way but it might not be the straightest.
Until next time.
/Y
lördag 12 september 2009
Interlude 4
This is the first and only bird I saw after my first 4 weeks in Shanghai. Safe but not so somehow similar to the Chinese view on life.
Anyone hungry for pig face? Found this in a shop on Nanjing Rd, one of the main tourist streets.
Fancy some Bufo bufos? These guys probably ended up on someone's dinner table. Picture taken outside a wet market in Pudong.
fredag 11 september 2009
Interlude 3
Picture taken from a mall opening downstairs from my home. I wish my beer could find its own way to the fridge.
Halloween and x-mas all put together in the middle of Sept. Welcome to Shanghai tourist festival.
I found this on the menu of a Vietnamese restaurant. Needless to say that I didn't order that dish.
söndag 6 september 2009
Faces of China
This is not a update of my current status in Shanghai, but rather something that has struck me from my interactions with foreign people here in China. Some of you might find this too much to swallow for a sunday, but all I can do is urge you to come back and read it sometime later.
China and it's two faces
Saying that China has 2 faces is probably nowhere near the truth. It certainly has many more. But I will at any rate start with 2.
On my way home yesterday, late into the night and decided to walk home. The route took me through a usually busy commercial district with shopping, restaurants, bars and hotels. But by night, this placed had turned into a trading ground for the people working in the business of recycling waste. People were trading boxes, plastics, papers, not bothered by the late hour.
That very location seemed to live 2 different lives, in the daytime, all the posh people skimming through designer shops, in the nighttime, all the people who are barely scraping by and making waste their livelihood. These faces, when looking more closely, are really not that different. Both are places of trade and commerce, where valuables are switching hands and deals are made. The nature of the place hasn't changed, it merely put on a different mask.
This example is somehow illustrative for the Chinese society in general. Nothing here has just one side. Nor is it any hydra that morphs into your worst nightmare. You just have to look an inch beneath the surface, or look at it from another angle, to discover the uniting factors.
Many who are foreign to China say that it is so different, complex, chaotic and so on. This is true for someone who have kept their native goggles. In order to understand China, one has to leave previous certainties and preconceived dogmas at the gates and be ready to learn through watching, listening, sensing, smelling, and imagining.
I have encountered many foreigners who might criticize Chinese in several ways, and also met those who praise Chinese along many dimensions. Both are in my mind right. In China, there are many realities to live in. You just have to choose which is yours.
China and it's two faces
Saying that China has 2 faces is probably nowhere near the truth. It certainly has many more. But I will at any rate start with 2.
On my way home yesterday, late into the night and decided to walk home. The route took me through a usually busy commercial district with shopping, restaurants, bars and hotels. But by night, this placed had turned into a trading ground for the people working in the business of recycling waste. People were trading boxes, plastics, papers, not bothered by the late hour.
That very location seemed to live 2 different lives, in the daytime, all the posh people skimming through designer shops, in the nighttime, all the people who are barely scraping by and making waste their livelihood. These faces, when looking more closely, are really not that different. Both are places of trade and commerce, where valuables are switching hands and deals are made. The nature of the place hasn't changed, it merely put on a different mask.
This example is somehow illustrative for the Chinese society in general. Nothing here has just one side. Nor is it any hydra that morphs into your worst nightmare. You just have to look an inch beneath the surface, or look at it from another angle, to discover the uniting factors.
Many who are foreign to China say that it is so different, complex, chaotic and so on. This is true for someone who have kept their native goggles. In order to understand China, one has to leave previous certainties and preconceived dogmas at the gates and be ready to learn through watching, listening, sensing, smelling, and imagining.
I have encountered many foreigners who might criticize Chinese in several ways, and also met those who praise Chinese along many dimensions. Both are in my mind right. In China, there are many realities to live in. You just have to choose which is yours.
måndag 31 augusti 2009
Shanghai Stories V - new apt, autumn and football commentators
The big news of the day is that I have moved to a new apt. Will be sharing it with 2 guys from Germany and Italy. This will make internet access easier and I'll be living closer to the parties and interviews. I will post some pictures later as soon as I have moved all the stuff in.
The weekend was pretty good and I wasn't nearly as tired from badminton as last week. It was not all thanks to my improved physic, but rather to the fact that "autumn" has arrived. The temperature was 25C when I stepped out of the apt on saturday and I almost cried of joy. It was such an refreshing feeling that I've not felt for a long time.
One of the best things in China is that they broadcast football from all the major European leagues as well as Champions league, albeit in the middle of the night. What I can't tolerate though are the commentators. They are the most useless bunch I've come across who don't give any insightful comments at all accept occasionally narrate what is going on in the match.... and consistently get it wrong. Every match, they will make 3-4 wrong comments about free kicks, offsides, etc. I won't bother you with more details but understand my mixed emotions of joy and pain when staying up late to try enjoy a match on TV.
Last week, there was a discussion on a shanghai expat forum about liberty in shanghai. The first person was concerned about his freedom being infringed upon but the common reply was that people (expats) were living more freely than in their home countries or anywhere else in the world. I think the fact of matter is that they were discussing personal freedom, as opposed to public freedom. You can curse on matters as long as you don't do it too openly, shops are open all hours of the night and you can basically live as you choose. The freedom to organize though is taken away or perhaps rather sacrificed on the alter of life style improvements. You would think that most Chinese people might not share same the view as the expats, seeing that most of them (99,99%) lack the means to live that freely. But the fact is that they mostly do. Of course they bicker and whine about the government, mostly about rising fuel costs or other everyday life stuff, but few of them want to necessarily change the government. They mostly want rid of the corruption and look back at the Mao-era as a time when politicians did something for the people.
I could of course continue for much longer but I will stop here before you grow tired of me. Until next time.
Your voice in Shanghai
/Y
The weekend was pretty good and I wasn't nearly as tired from badminton as last week. It was not all thanks to my improved physic, but rather to the fact that "autumn" has arrived. The temperature was 25C when I stepped out of the apt on saturday and I almost cried of joy. It was such an refreshing feeling that I've not felt for a long time.
One of the best things in China is that they broadcast football from all the major European leagues as well as Champions league, albeit in the middle of the night. What I can't tolerate though are the commentators. They are the most useless bunch I've come across who don't give any insightful comments at all accept occasionally narrate what is going on in the match.... and consistently get it wrong. Every match, they will make 3-4 wrong comments about free kicks, offsides, etc. I won't bother you with more details but understand my mixed emotions of joy and pain when staying up late to try enjoy a match on TV.
Last week, there was a discussion on a shanghai expat forum about liberty in shanghai. The first person was concerned about his freedom being infringed upon but the common reply was that people (expats) were living more freely than in their home countries or anywhere else in the world. I think the fact of matter is that they were discussing personal freedom, as opposed to public freedom. You can curse on matters as long as you don't do it too openly, shops are open all hours of the night and you can basically live as you choose. The freedom to organize though is taken away or perhaps rather sacrificed on the alter of life style improvements. You would think that most Chinese people might not share same the view as the expats, seeing that most of them (99,99%) lack the means to live that freely. But the fact is that they mostly do. Of course they bicker and whine about the government, mostly about rising fuel costs or other everyday life stuff, but few of them want to necessarily change the government. They mostly want rid of the corruption and look back at the Mao-era as a time when politicians did something for the people.
I could of course continue for much longer but I will stop here before you grow tired of me. Until next time.
Your voice in Shanghai
/Y
fredag 28 augusti 2009
Shanghai Stories IV
My third week has come to an end and I just realized how life in a city can wear you down. It could be due to lack of green spaces, poor air, the heat or any number of reasons. I have really wanted to escape this place for a weekend or so, won't be this week but perhaps next one.
Arranged to move in to my new room on tuesday. Looking forward to easier access to internet and some company at least some evening. So far, this week has been ok. Met 2 new friends from Shanghai and went out for dinner a couple of times. It makes it easier to kill some time and .
My mind has mostly been preoccupied with interviews, 3 in total. The first one went well and seemed to be the most challenging position. It is for that position I am doing the case study and I have honestly barely left the starting line. The second interview was not really an interview. I went to see a headhunter who kind of told me to go back to Sweden.... She thought that I wouldn't stand a chance in Shanghai due to my inexperience... (2+ years). Anyway, I got taken down a little and was little upset for a while but shrugged if off me quite quickly. The third one was today with Frost & Sullivan who write reports and help clients do market research. We hit it off pretty well and I am hoping on getting answers from them next week.
Anyhow, weekend coming up and it will be badminton on saturday followed by pain on sunday.
Here is a picture I took at the subway station on my way home from the interview.
I wondered if I can put myself through the "Automatic Addvalue Machine".... That might make be more attractive to the employers as well as give me a higher salary. :)
Until next time (hopefully soon)
Your voice in Shanghai
/Y
Arranged to move in to my new room on tuesday. Looking forward to easier access to internet and some company at least some evening. So far, this week has been ok. Met 2 new friends from Shanghai and went out for dinner a couple of times. It makes it easier to kill some time and .
My mind has mostly been preoccupied with interviews, 3 in total. The first one went well and seemed to be the most challenging position. It is for that position I am doing the case study and I have honestly barely left the starting line. The second interview was not really an interview. I went to see a headhunter who kind of told me to go back to Sweden.... She thought that I wouldn't stand a chance in Shanghai due to my inexperience... (2+ years). Anyway, I got taken down a little and was little upset for a while but shrugged if off me quite quickly. The third one was today with Frost & Sullivan who write reports and help clients do market research. We hit it off pretty well and I am hoping on getting answers from them next week.
Anyhow, weekend coming up and it will be badminton on saturday followed by pain on sunday.
Here is a picture I took at the subway station on my way home from the interview.
I wondered if I can put myself through the "Automatic Addvalue Machine".... That might make be more attractive to the employers as well as give me a higher salary. :)
Until next time (hopefully soon)
Your voice in Shanghai
/Y
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