Figures speak for themselves: nearly 100 million rail trips were made across the nation in the 20 days before, during and after the this year's Spring Festival. This means that 3 million people were on the move every day on China's rail network.

If these figures fail to strike a chord with those who misunderstand this nation's family planning policy, the net increase of 8 to 10 million newborn babies annually clearly illustrates why this policy will be essential for some time to come in order to guarantee that the Chinese people continue to enjoy improvements to their standard of living.

Launched in 1980, the family planning policy was necessary in order to ensure China's population did not grow to the point where its resources could not provide for it.

Apart from the deep-rooted traditional concept favoring big families, pragmatic considerations about support from one's offspring during old age made it difficult to carry out the one-child policy to the letter in China's vast rural areas.

In the late 1980s and early 1990s, publicity promoting the family planning policy was primarily aimed at rural residents. The most famous skit that was staged during a Spring Festival TV gala was about a couple who had several girls but insisted on continuing their reproduction until they had a boy, who could carry on the family bloodline and take care of his parents when they were old.

The message from this skit was that the countryside, poverty-stricken areas in particular, were where it was the most difficult to carry out the family planning policy.

Although the policy has allowed a great many rural residents to have two children, some still defied the policy when they failed to have a boy after having two or more girls.

At the same time, the birth rate among residents in major cities such as Beijing and Shanghai continued to fall. The latter became the first city in the country with it mortality rate outstripping its birth rate.

The contrast between the plummeting urban birth rate and the relatively high rural birth rate has shifted the blame onto rural residents for their lack of an "enlightened outlook" when it came to having children.

The poorer rural residents are, the stronger their urge to have more children. However, we must bear in mind that these poorer villagers are among the most vulnerable members of society. Having more children cuts their chances of falling into absolute poverty when they are in their old age.

When it dawns on more and more rural residents that the more children they have, the poorer they become at least for the time being, and when governments at various levels start to relieve them of their worries by establishing pension systems, the birth rate in rural areas does start to fall.

However, the latest challenge to the family planning policy can now be found at the other end of the social spectrum the nation's nouveau riche.

These wealthy people have totally different considerations when it come to having more children. Ostensibly, they could list the drawbacks of having just one child: an only child is more likely to be spoilt, to develop a self-centered disposition and have more weaknesses in character.

Whatever the reasons, the fact is that they are wealthy enough to pay the heavy fines imposed for the violation of family planning policy and are also able to deal with ever-increasing educational expenses.

The revised population and family planning law that took effect in 2002 stipulates that those who violate the family planning policy by giving birth to more than one child must pay for the social cost of raising this child. The payment varies in different localities, and can be as high as hundreds of thousands of yuan in South China's Guangdong Province. A quite wealthy family there was reported to have paid 780,000 yuan ($100,000) in order to have several children.

In addition, some pregnant women travel overseas in order to escape the policy's economic penalties. Some others bribe officials in order to get certificates claiming that their first child is either mentally or physically disabled, thus giving them the right to have a second child.

Whatever ways they use, money becomes the sole lubricant for the violation of the country's fundamental population policy.

Limited as the number of quite wealthy people is, the number of extra children they have will not have a great impact on the population situation of the country for the time being. But the repercussions in terms of fairness and equality are beyond measure.

They make a mockery of the national policy by showing that it can be rendered meaningless with money.

In fact, violators of the family planning policy can have as many children as they want as long as they can pay the social costs of raising these children.

Of course, very few violators have more than three children, but if any one wants to, he can because there are no complementary punishment measures for repeated violations in this regard.

Without being pressured by a kind of complementary punishment, these violators may feel proud of a supposed superiority based on their wealth. And it is quite possible that more will follow their shoddy example.

In addition, these violations have an impact on the psychology of the poor, possibly intensifying their resentment of the rich and making them even more certain that the gap between the haves and have-nots is brewing social injustice.

To be frank, it is really difficult for the government to introduce additional punishments to stop these wealthy people from having more children.

Some suggest that those violators need to be blacklisted, and that they should be barred from being awarded or given credit for whatever they have accomplished. This can be a complementary penalty.

The authorities in East China's Zhejiang Province have decided to publish the names of the violators in the media.

This may be a good way to let them know that money cannot erase the disgrace of blatant violation of State policy before we have better rules to stop wealthy people from giving birth to more children than they should.

Source: China Daily