In today’s China, the focus on relationships, or guanxi, in business rather than adherence to rules and regulations is leading to volatility in China’s billionaires’ wealth. Recently, they demonstrate the ability to lose their wealth just as quickly as they gain it, especially with businessmen who become so rich as to become a threat to the Party. This is why many of China’s wealthiest fear speaking openly about their wealth, turning it into an even more sensitive topic.
n the past six years, the amount of billionaires on China’s rich list has gone up from 15 to 250, with the majority of these living in Beijing. More surprisingly, when examining this list, many are eventually bankrupted, convicted, arrested, or even executed. This is now happening more and more, in an increased effort made by the Chinese government to show their dedication to fighting corruption.
Although many have associated appearing on the rich list with being convicted, there are also those who argue that wealthy individuals not on the list are just as likely to be arrested in China. Those who form their links between appearing on the rich list and being convicted base their opinions on a recently published study showing that 17% of those on the list end up in court or in jail, as opposed to 7% of those wealthy individuals that remain unlisted. Some of the arrested were even eventually executed as a result of their crimes. This explains how China’s rich list, or bai fu bang, has now got its new nickname – (fat) pig killing list, or sha zhu bang.
The bai fu bang was first designed and published in 1999 by Rupert Hoogewerf, who was educated at Eton College and has a degree in Chinese and Japanese from Durham College. It is posted yearly in Forbes and Forbes’ Chinese equivalent Hurun. A lot of assets in China go unrecorded, and sources argue that most people on the list are actually a lot wealthier than the official estimates.
This comes at a time when the gap between rich and poor in China is becoming increasingly noticeable. This is in contrast to official data claiming the lowest inequality in a decade; a Gini coefficient of 0.474 when compared to the 2003 figure of 0.479. While poverty reduction has been especially impressive since Deng Xiaoping’s reforms in 1989, China does still battle with severe inequality. This is especially apparent within the bigger cities like Chongqing, which was recently officially named as China’s biggest city, and central to the Bo Xilai scandal.
by Margaux Schreurs
