If you're a "single dog," a "bare branch," a "leftover man" or a "leftover woman" - all monikers for unmarried Chinese - you may find Valentine's Day particularly trying.
Judging by the numbers, quite a few of the long faces on Tuesday should belong to men.
That's because China's gender gap remains huge. There were 33.59 million more men than women in China in 2016, according to figures from the country's National Bureau of Statistics that were issued last month, and 48.78 percent of China's 1.38 billion people are female, compared with a global average of 49.55 percent.
For men, especially those lower on the socioeconomic ladder, marriage can be hard to attain.
The reasons for the gap are well known: a traditional preference for boys, compounded by the "one child" policy instituted in 1979 that led millions of couples to abort female fetuses. Worried by one of the world's lowest fertility rates, the government changed the policy last year to permit all couples to have two children.
According to 2010 national census data, about 24.7 percent of Chinese men and 18.5 percent of women above the age of 15 have never been married, Ms. Li said. The government regularly says that China has 200 million singletons and frets in the state news media over who will care for them in their old age without a family of their own. In China, elder care is the legal responsibility of adult children.
The gender ratio in China appears to be falling, from a high of 121 boys born for every 100 girls in 2004 to about 113.5 boys in 2015, according to official figures. Worldwide, the ratio is about 104 boys to 100 girls.
However, in its recent census report, the statistics bureau did not provide the gender ratio for 2016, so it is unclear whether the trend is continuing.
If you're a "single dog," a "bare branch," a "leftover man" or a "leftover woman" - all monikers for unmarried Chinese - you may find Valentine's Day particularly trying.
