44867feejw1ebnwkax5zaj20fa0ant9i.jpg (Photo : yzxyz117.blogchina.com)
Professor Dong Pan from Beijing Normal University business school recently gave bold comments on Beijing real estate market, saying that real estate prices are indeed too low in Beijing, which causes the overpopulation of the city. Media can't agree with him even at a minimum degree, saying that he's only giving outrageous opinions to get famous.
Here is what Dong has said to the media exactly:
About all the discussion we had about these questions at the seminar, I'm afraid I can't agree with Dr. Chen. The new generation of the leaders have come up with a lot of new ideas, new concepts and have made lots of new plans. But there is really no reform or anything new. Mr. Ren Zhiqiang has thought everything through long time ago. That's why he is actively expressing his own opinions on the real estate industry regardless what other people think. I'm afraid the government leaders are still missing important pieces of the puzzle. That's why they don't really have any plans on balancing the market or lower the prices.
The second point I'd like to point out is that even if the government really wants to do something to bring the market prices down, they can't. The growth of the real estate market means the growth of China's overall economy - employment, tax income etc. So the prices can't go down, though people wish they could. People want more affordable housing from the government, which is something the government can never give them. So the government can't do anything but go silent.
Real Estate industry is the fundamental of a society. You can't do anything business without the support of real estate. Can you open a restaurant without a commercial space? Can you open the stock market without having the financial centers buildings set up? Can you open retails store without a shopping plaza? Trying to bring down the real estate market is absolutely horrific, it's anti-society.
One way we can efficiently improve Beijing's terrible traffic is to, instead of lower the real estate prices, blow them up. People will automatically move out of the city if the houses are too expensive for them so they lose their dwellings. That's another benefit of raising up the house prices.
