The Chinese President Xi Jinping has masterminded a major policy shift for the world’s second largest economy by underscoring the imperative of “common prosperity” (共同富裕, Gongtong fuyu). At a recent meeting of the Central Finance and Economic Affairs Commission (CFEC), which he leads, Xi said that a relatively equal income distribution across disparate sectors of the populace and geographical areas was “an essential requirement of socialism and a key feature of Chinese-style modernization” (Xinhua, August 17). Xi has apparently made seminal revisions to reform-era chief architect Deng Xiaoping’s philosophy that “to get rich is glorious.” Deng’s quasi-capitalist strategy helped to produce 1,058 billionaires in the Greater China Region last year, compared to 696 in the U.S. and 171 in India (Hurun List 2021, March 2). Common prosperity has also been cited by Xi and his fellow ideologues as the “original quintessence” (初心, chuxin) of socialism.
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