In 15 years China will have the world’s largest elderly population. By 2050, its working-age population will have declined by 200+ million people. China’s rapidly aging population will have a significant impact on all aspects of China, and constructing a social safety net to meet its needs will be both expensive and complicated.

China’s long history with its concentric cycles of buildup and decay tends to support the notion that the general political outlook is knowable, while the specifics remain indeterminate due to complexity. Nothing short of society-wide endeavor can stem the tide of negative trends and polluting influences. Change, for the better, and for the worse, sets in slowly and incrementally, often beyond immediate perception.

The unspoken trade-off between the Chinese rulers and the ruled seems to be: If our lives improve, then you can remain in power. So far, the Chinese Communist Party has been adept at reading the tealeaves and adapting to the times, and will need to gradually change further as the economy slows down.

China’s 13th Five-Year Plan, an economic and social blueprint, could give important insights to U.S. companies planning China business strategies, by providing industry specific plans, local designations for free trade zones, and new policies across the country.

China’s new Five-Year Plan emphasizes the quality of growth rather than speed as the country enters a period of ‘new normal’. Maintaining 6.5 percent of economic growth is a priority, but it is even more important to keep such a growth rate sustainable and to channel that growth toward improving the quality of life for the majority of Chinese citizens.

The Chinese premier’s frankness in his report embodied not only decision-makers’ policy orientations, but also a profound people-first mentality that will be of far-reaching significance.

Since the global financial crisis of 2008, the growth track and pattern of the world economy have undergone dramatic changes, and maintaining an easy monetary policy by the central banks will not be enough to remedy the situation. New “supply substitution” is needed to improve the productivity and innovative output of all factors, and to earnestly promote global economic growth.

As it acts upon the 13th Five Year Plan, Beijing must combine government fiscal investment, corporate R&D, industrial investment, venture capital, bank credit investment, capital market financing, science funding and more, to make a financial system with a full range of support to update China’s economy. An efficiently operating system will be key to the nation’s future competitiveness.

Since the announcement of the new policy, Chinese feminists have been concerned that women aren’t really given full freedom to choose whether to have a second child – or any child at all – due to cultural and public policy reasons.

China’s goal of achieving “Xiao Kang” — or “moderately prosperous society” by 2020 aims to make sure that the remaining families still in poverty also step into the well-off society together with the rest of the nation. The author argues that outside world tends to look at China as if it is another traditional power and thus loses sight of what is really going on inside China. With poverty alleviation a continuing top priority, the uppermost imperative is for China to have a stable external environment so that it can attend to its own monumental challenges.