Comment: Stability and Commercial Information

An Economic Approach and a Look at China

Abstract

China's transition to a market economy is accompanied by an unprecedented economic growth. However, due to structural problems the economic dynamism seems to have been running out of steam since the late 1990s. In its recent report "China in the World Economy. The Domestic Policy Challenges", the OECD attributes the structural problems to a lack of integration in factor markets, among business segments, and among regions. The OECD report is comprised of an impressive number of sector studies and analyses of economy-wide issues. It is based on the commonly available set of Chinese government data without questioning whether we can rely on this official version of reality. In contrast, the question of the quality of official information has been frequently picked up in many press reports and by a number of economists over the past years.