China's Macroeconomic Development: The Role of Gradualist Reforms

This paper reviews recent literature on China's macroeconomic development, emphasizing the critical role of the gradualist approach over the past four decades. Beyond China's structural transformation, we explore various aspects such as high saving rates, the housing boom, an expanding current account surplus, and rising inequality. We propose a unifying framework that encapsulates key development stages, contrasting gradualism with a laissez-faire counterfactual. Our analysis illustrates how China's gradual policy reforms, amidst highly imperfect financial markets, have effectively helped spur GDP growth throughout its macroeconomic evolution. We highlight the tradeoffs between accelerating GDP growth and safeguarding China's long-term financial stability.