The stereotypes of poor farm workers guiding water buffalos through rice paddies remain ingrained in the minds of Americans. “Made in China” is everywhere we look and on everything we purchase, yet Western preconceptions of China show how Americans and Europeans fundamentally misunderstand China and its youth. If the youth in China are so poor, then why are they a major target of Western companies?  If so much seems to be made and invested in China, then wouldn’t the resourceful, highly educated Chinese youth eventually become wealthier?  Can these supposedly “poor children” eventually become the leaders of the global economy in the next 10-20 years?

 

By the year 2020, China is expected to become the second largest economy in the world, developing into a vast consumer market with a sizeable middle class.  On every newsstand sits a magazine issue on China fever. Yet even after The Reform Era in China, little is known about China’s Generation Y, consisting of approximately 200 million young individuals born between 1980 and 1989.

 

Michael Stanat went to explore new territory in China, ultimately realizing the significance of the generation.  Adding not only extensive research to the book, Stanat also brings unseen insight to understanding Gen Y.  China’s Generation Y follows the youth on their unprecedented journey from a young generation in a communistic country to one entrenched in an emerging global capitalist, consumerist market.  How really different are they?  Will China’s youth rebel against their parents and culture’s values, quickly adopting western products and lifestyle?  Where will they plan to purchase cars, clothing, food and literature?   Do they share the same political values as their parents?  What problems will they face, and will they be as docile in the future? China’s Generation Y: Understanding the Future Leaders of the World’s Next Superpower provides us with the insight to learn about a so-far silent generation and grow familiar with it.

 

Gen Y in Facts

 

 

- There are approximately 367 million people under the age of 18 in China, much greater than the entire population of the U.S.

 

- China’s Gen Y is itself composed of approximately 200 million individuals between the ages of 15 and 25.

 

- Each year, four times as many students in China become engineers than do U.S. students, placing the U.S.’s technological and scientific superiority in

   jeopardy.

   Economists use this statistic as an indicator for possible future breakthroughs.

 

- China’s Gen Y teens are significantly more entrepreneurial and capitalistic than their parent generation, and with market reforms, can more easily become      

   entrepreneurs.

 

- Annually, approximately twenty million individuals in China become of teenage age.

 

- China’s Gen Y is by far more connected to the Internet and by mobile phones than any older generation in China.

 

- One study found that Gen Y single children often consume an astonishing 50% or more of family expenditure in some major cities.  Other surveys confirm the

   findings.

 

- China’s youth generally know more about Westerners than Westerners know about them.

Advance Praise for China’s Generation Y

 

 

Stanat’s work is a laudable contribution, as it provides a comprehensive study on China’s Generation Y, ranging from its socio-political consequences to the generational gap and the economic factors that ensue. This research builds a more nuanced and objective understanding of this generation.

— Eva H. Shi, former editor-in-chief, Harvard Asia Pacific Review

 

As someone who lived and worked in China for several years [as a management consultant with McKinsey & Company in Beijing], I was struck by how closely Michael Stanat’s accounts resonated with my own observations and experiences.

— Christopher J. Fry, president, Strategic Management Solutions Group

 

For American companies who want to capitalize on the purchasing power of China’s Gen Y, this book is a must-read. The author clearly dispels the myths of Gen Y in China, so Americans beware: China’s youth today will propel its nation to be a global economic giant tomorrow.

— Lee-En Chung, president, Ivy Ventures, Inc.

 

Michael Stanat has probably seen more of the world in his short life than most adults ever will. His combination of facts and impressions of China and its youth make for a quick and fascinating read that will help you prepare for the inevitable upheaval that has already begun.

— Ira Schloss, director of corporate planning, Thomas Publishing Co.

 

Michael Stanat combines a thorough appreciation of the political and economic background to China's Generation Y with a deep personal understanding of this new generation.

— Joachim E. Seydel, International Research Consultant, London

 

“Michael has captured China Gen Y's zest for technology, entrepreneurship and capitalism. Similar to the teenagers, the Shanghai Stock Exchange and the Internet in China are working out their true value and identity under strict regulations and heavy censorship. The 21st century will provide us with a truly globalized financial industry, in which China's Generation Y will play an important role. Special kudos to Stanat for bringing to light this generation and its future potential in world markets.”

— June Klein, CEO Technology & Marketing Ventures, Inc.,

and Author, Evolution Of Trading: How Technology and Governance are Changing Finance in the 21st Century.

 

TABLE OF CONTENTS

 

Table of Contents

Preface

Foreword

Acknowledgements

Prologue

 

1. Introduction

2. Gen Y under Communism

3. Lifestyles of a Generation

4. Chinese Society and the Individual

5. Living Environment

6. Dreams and Development

7. Gen Y’s Inherited Economy

8. Purchasing Power and Wants

9. A Promising Future

 

Bibliography

Index

 

 

 

The following is an excerpt from the beginning of the book.

 

Welcome to the world of China's Generation Y! This is a world that has until now been relatively uninfluenced by the Western hand, a world where a bustling and burgeoning group of unknown, enthusiastic youth is growing and learning. This world is a place where buildings rise faster than they fall, and where technology spreads faster than in most other countries. Western thought and bias previously precluded Americans from wanting to learn about this generation. We were taught to ignore China and its vast population, for each person was ostensibly designed as a servant to a hostile communistic state. There persisted an unfounded belief that China could never overtake the West. However, strong indications from its freer market economy, vast population of highly educated employees, and other indications from its new generation of Chinese youth- who are more accepting of foreigners-all point to China's advances on its path to becoming a world superpower.

 

 

For most Americans, accepting China as a potential superpower is a tough cookie to chew on, for it ostensibly marks a period of declining American hegemony around the world. Unbeknownst to many Americans, their country has lost most of its competitive industries to foreign countries. It has lost electronics, information technology, manufacturing, aerospace, and, in most cases, luxury goods to countries like Japan and China. The United States is left with car manufacturing, entertainment, pharmaceutical and manufacturing technology, Wal-Mart, and highly inflated real estate. While America loses the industries it championed as its key to superpower status, China rapidly incubates these industries with its vast population of low-paid, educated workers and now more relaxed market-entry laws. Whereas the American middle class is pressed for money as a result of rising expenditures from the grocery bill all the way to college education- a new middle class in China flourishes, resembling the products of the socio-economic changes in America during the 1950s. While America worried about homosexuals on television and fomented a sanctimonious battle to save the country from liberals, China consistently grew its economy on average by 20 percent for the past twenty years, though some economists find the true rate of growth in 2003 to be around 13 percent. It did so while maintaining a revenue surplus of approximately $500 billion, in contrast to America's trillion upon trillion-dollar deficits that have caused the dollar to plummet, as it will continue to do for several more years. In fact, China's economy was so hot that its central bank needed to slow growth by raising interest rates in order to stop inflation.

 

China is currently undergoing a renaissance relative to the "dark ages" of the Cultural Revolution in the 1960s. Economy, religion, culture, society, education, and living conditions are all flourishing, causing massive social and political changes in a country that completely rebuked such influences two and one- half decades ago. Likewise, the youth in China during this renaissance are being molded increasingly by the flourishing Western influences that are pervading their country. Ironically, these individuals were born amidst rapid change and confusion, but they are the vehicles that will take China into an optimistic future immersed in technology, consumerism, and economic prosperity it has not seen for centuries.

 

Yet a large number of Americans still have their heads in the sand. America's longstanding preconception of 1.3 billion people toiling on fields of rice patties neglects the optimistic reality of a growing and extremely motivated capitalistic bourgeoisie in China's urban areas. Others contend that the economic growth will be short-lived, similar to South Korea's lack of momentum in intense development. China, however, differs from South Korea in several significant ways. China has a huge workforce and a massive young population that speak English. China is dedicated to its expansion by allowing gold to be acquired, adjusting interest rates, and adapting its political and economic doctrine by entering in the World Trade Organization (WTO). China has, in the past several decades, made strategic decisions about its development. Unlike Western democracies, China can brutally crush dissent in problematic areas without receiving massive protests from the international community. In effect, the international community has resigned itself to China's administration; shunning China would be an economic nightmare for any nation that makes a clamor about human rights violations.

 

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