Since 1978, Chinese economy has made great achievements. Chinese GDP (Gross Domestic Product) has grown from 362.41[1] billion Chinese yuan (268.3 billion US dollars) in 1978 to 20,940.7 billion Chinese yuan (2,229 billion US dollars) in 2006. The annual growth rate of GDP was 9.67 percent from 1978 to 2006. It was much higher than that of the world economy, which was about 3.3 percent on average in the same period. China has overtaken all the other countries in GDP except the USA, Japan and Germany, becoming the world's fourth largest economy. The total value of import and export in 2006 reached 1,760.7 billion US dollars, making China the third largest trader in the world.
Due to the development of economy, the people’s standard of living in China has been greatly improved. The income of residents increased greatly. The per capita disposable income of urban residents was 11,759 yuan in 2006. The net income of rural residents was 3,587 yuan in 2006. The basic necessities of life, including the food, the clothing, the housing and the transportation, are much better now than those thirty years ago. Chinese per capita consumption of meat, eggs, aquatic products and vegetables has surpassed the world’s average. More and more Chinese are enjoying the convenience brought by cars, mobile phones, personal computers and Internet. Every person in China can feel the improvements in life caused by rapid economic development.
After rapid development of about thirty years, many people, including leaders of the country, economists and even ordinary citizens, begin to think of the future of Chinese economy. People are wondering whether Chinese economy can keep the high growth rate in the future. On this point, there are two sharply contrast opinions. One opinion is that China will become a grand economic country and get prosperous day by day. This is the opinion of the mainstream media in China. Some foreign researchers, like Robert Mundell, the winner of the Nobel Prize for Economics in 1999, predict that Chinese economic growth will sustain expeditious development for the next twenty years. The other opinion is that because of some factors like the corruption, the increasing difference between the rich and the poor, Chinese economy will collapse in the coming future. Some experts, like Gordon G. Chang, the author of the book The Coming Collapse of China, hold this opinion. However, it is commonly admitted that there are both opportunities and challenges for Chinese economy. Different experts focus on different challenges. Professor Zhang Weiying, a famous economist in PekingUniversity, focused on the increase of labor cost. Bert Hofman, an expert of the World Bank, focused on the difference of the rich and the poor. Zhou Xiaochuan, the former Governor of the People's Bank of China, thought that the main challenges facing Chinese economy were the aggregate investment in some industries

[1] All the figures in this section are from the website of National Bureau of Statistics of China, http://www.stats.gov.cn

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