China Eases Its One-Child Policy, Couples Can Have a Second Child; 80s Law Averted 400 Million Births;

China is easing its thirty year old one-child policy. China introduced the one-child restrictions in the late 1970s because they saw their population growth spinning out of control.

The Chinese government announced that it will loosen its family planning restrictions nationwide. This will let millions of families have two children. This is the most significant liberalization the policy since it was instituted three decades ago.

Under the new loosening of China's one-child restrictions, couples in which one parent is an only child are now allowed to have a second child without being fined. China's ruling Communist Party announced several reforms that it will implement over the next decade.

China's government started looking at an overhaul of the one-child policy about five years ago. They were concerned that the controls were undermining economic growth. China also realized it had to deal with a rapidly ageing population that I would have to financially support.

Scholars advised China's government to amend the one child restrictions. They found that the restrictions were outdated and harmful to the economy. Analysts say the one-child policy shrunk China's labor pool and hurt its economic growth. The working age population fell for the first time in 2012.  China could be the first country in the world where its population will get old before it gets rich.

This may be the first step in abolishing the restrictions.

Wang Feng, a sociology professor at Fudan University who specializes in China's demographics said "The demographic significance is minimal but the political significance is substantial. This is one of the most urgent policy changes that we've been awaiting for years. What this will mean is a very speedy abolishment of the one-child policy."

China allowed rural families with a girl to have two children in the 1980s, Wang said. "Ever since the '80s, there's been nothing as clear as this."

Wang Guangzhou, a demographer at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, a government think-tank, estimates that the new policy will 30 million women of child-bearing age. China has nearly 1.4 billion people.

China's one-child policy are more complicated than they appear. The way the law is now, couples in urban areas can have a second child if both parents do not have siblings. Couples in rural areas can have two children if their first-born is a girl. Parents who are only children can have two children at most. Rules for ethnic minorities are looser. There are numerous other exceptions. Couple who violate the one-child restrictions were required to pay a large fine.

Beijing says the policy helped avert 400 million births since 1980. The one-child policy covers 63 percent of the country's population.