Decoding official statistics takes both sides
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Statistics, when properly used, is a magnificent instrument that makes modern politics and public policy tangible. It is more frequently used than ever in political debates, public policy analysis, and even political satire and sharp criticism.
The recently revealed Wikileaks Logs have succeeded in drawing the public eye by quantitatively describing the carnage in Iraq using cold figures rather than compelling words.
But statistics have often been the target of criticism in China, where they have little credibility. The credibility of Chinese statistics is habitually questioned by what statisticians perceive as a statistically illiterate public.
Meanwhile, misuses or even abuses of statistics by statistically unprofessional journalists also contribute public anger at the contradictory figures. Usually, cursory journalism tends to sensationalize the implication of figures, without presenting them correctly.
The errors thus proliferate, and finally become seen as truth. These false impressions include the idea that Chinese citizens share too little of the country's GDP growth, derived from the widely cited low labor returns as percentage of GDP in comparison to other major economies.
In fact, numbers in the cited report, Labor Remuneration of Persons Employed in Urban Units, released by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), only accounts for a part of the total labor income. According to the clarifications by some economists like Hua Sheng, the labor share of GDP, calibrated in the same fashion as other countries, is around 45 percent to 50 percent, which can be satisfactorily compared to other developing countries.
NBS and the top statisticians nationwide are well aware of the situation, as they are frequently bombarded by unprofessional questions and have been inured to the media's statistical ignorance. The most recent move is to print a book, China's Main Statistical Concepts: Standards and Methodology, to illustrate how statistics are produced in China and to strengthen the public understanding of the statistical work.
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