For Song Jingli, a 39-year-old founder of a communications start-up in Beijing, 2023 was supposed to be a year of big spending. She and her husband hoped to travel to New Zealand and buy a second apartment in the Chinese capital.
But by the time summer arrived, the state of the economy had persuaded them to avoid expensive purchases. “It’s like when you know the storm is coming,” said Song. “You stay away from the water.”
As China slides into deflation for the first time since 2021 — consumer prices fell 0.3 per cent year on year in July — people are thinking carefully about how they spend their money. The property market has slowed, exports are weak and youth unemployment has soared, but policymakers have stopped short of enacting major stimulus.