Despite a public push to incentivise young adults to start a family – including an overhaul of family planning policies to allow people to have three children – a new survey suggests the marriage rate will only fall in the coming years.
The survey, organised by the Central Committee of the Communist Youth League, found that more than one-third of nearly 3,000 respondents “did not want to enter a relationship ” and were uncertain if their opinion would ever change.
The high costs of starting a family is the top reasons for their reluctance. The survey interviewed people between 18 and 26 years old who lived in urban areas.
Over 60 per cent of the people surveyed said it was hard to find the right person to marry. About 56 per cent said it was because “raising a kid is too expensive”, and 46 per cent said, “getting married is too expensive”.
In Chinese tradition, married couples are expected to be able to afford a home and a large engagement fund. Recently, a car has been added to that equation.
Young women are particularly reluctant to get married.
About 44 per cent of the female respondents said they wouldn’t marry or were not sure if they would, nearly 20 percentage points higher than the men surveyed.
The most common reason was they did not want to have kids, the survey showed.