Essay Sample on China's One Child Policy

How many kids might you want when you're older? Maybe 2, 3, and so on, but what if you lived in China? What if you wanted more than one child, then you might have issues with the population police. In 1979 China created the One Child Policy in hopes to reduce its population. The One Child Policy meant that you could only have one child, otherwise, you would be punished by the population police. They would take many precautions so women wouldn’t get pregnant a second time. Many people might say it raised their standard of living or created economic success for China, but it also created a mouthful of problems for China more than they could swallow. The One Child policy created more issues than it actually solved. One problem was it made people make very difficult decisions regarding their pregnancy. And it created a lot of issues for the younger generation.

One reason the One Child Policy affected China negatively is it made many people and families make difficult decisions regarding their pregnancies. For example, according to The 12 Pros and Cons of China’s One Child Policy by Louise Gallie, “To avoid financially devastating fines, families who were having a second child and didn’t have an exemption would seek out abortion providers or abandon their children outright without identification. For families that wanted a boy and had a girl, this created numerous orphans and murders that were needless.”This matters because many families were choosing to get rid of their children that were girls. Making a further issue of having an imbalanced gender ratio. Creating too many men to marry women, making China’s population shrink further.  And many women had to choose to abort their children, to avoid further fines for having additional kids. Without this policy, many families wouldn’t have to make these devastating decisions. Another example. China’s One-Child Policy by Kim Kyung-Hoon states, “ Many such parents therefore kept their “above quota” children hidden from public view. Their official invisibility meant that these children were not given a residence permit, called a hukou, which meant they could not get health care, attend school, or even get a library card.”This makes a major impact on China because so many people in China have now had no opportunity to get a job or do things are normal humans would. It also portrays how intense it was to hide extra children from the government.  And that families took extreme measures to have more than one kid.As you can tell this policy made people all over China make tremendously difficult decisions to avoid issues with the government.

Another big issue with the One Child Policy is that it puts immense pressure on the younger generation of China. For example, the article, China’s One Child Policy by Kim Kyung-Hoon states, “In fact, some young adults in China who are single children face the possibility of having to support two parents and up to four grandparents, a situation referred to as the “4-2-1 problem” This affects a lot of young adults born into the One Child Policy financially. Most young adults don’t have the time or money to help support their elders. This situation makes it very difficult to take care of these 6 elders adequately because they already have many responsibilities. And elderly people have many medical issues or they can't drive or even go grocery shopping, making those necessities a burden for many young people. A second example from the same article is, “ Many are also under intense pressure to meet their parents’ high expectations that they will do well in school and get a prestigious and high-paying job in the future.”This illustrates that only children in China feel like they have to live up to their parent's expectations. With the spotlight only on them as a child, it makes them feel like they have to be the perfect child for their parents. And they have to always worry about trying to be the best when that isn’t realistic or healthy for most kids. As you can tell, the One Child Policy puts a massive amount of responsibility and pressure on children and young adults of China.

Some people who think that controlling the population and the One Child Policy was a good idea believe that it was successful because it helped China with economic success. But, the new lower populations created an imbalance between the number of elders and young people in China. This creates fewer workers and it puts a burden on children to take care of their 4 grandparents and 2 parents. And without as many workers China can’t produce as much money, especially if most of their money is now going to the elderly community. 

Overall China’s One Child policy had more negative effects than it solved. This matters because this policy made so many issues in China that may never leave. These problems may get in the way of China's success in the future.