Lewis Turning Point To Test The Upgrading Ability Of Textile Enterprises

I recently felt in the interview.

This view is put forward by Nobel prize winner, American economist Arthur Lewis.

He believes that with the growth of labor force, there is a large number of hidden unemployment in the agricultural sector.

When the industrial sector provides a higher level of fixed wages, the labor force in the agricultural sector shifts to the industrial sector, and with the pfer of the surplus rural labor force, the industrial sector continues to expand.

Because the supply of labor force is unlimited on the established wage level, the industrial sector will turn the profits into reinvestment when the real wages remain unchanged, and the scale will continue to expand until the surplus labor force is absorbed in the countryside. At that time, the wage will change from horizontal movement to steep rise, which is called "Lewis turning point" by economics.

The most sensitive to this phenomenon is textiles and so on.

The eastern developed areas are facing the test first.

When interviewed in the eastern coastal areas of Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Guangdong and Fujian, the author found that labor costs and labor shortages were the most obvious.

The head of Foshan Xinguang knitting company told me that the employment situation of textile enterprises in Foshan is becoming more and more tense.

Over the past two years, after the new year's day and the Spring Festival holiday, the phenomenon of migrant workers returning to work without returning to work often appears and is quite common.

At the same time, the voices of workers demanding higher wages are higher and higher.

"In order to stabilize production, enterprises generally try to meet the requirements of workers, but the labor costs of enterprises have risen sharply, and the comprehensive cost of raw materials and energy has been increasing. The burden of enterprises has become heavier and heavier, especially for small and medium-sized enterprises."

The person in charge told the author.

The arrival of "Lewis turning point" is inevitable, and the development of textile industry is also facing a rebirth.

The head of Guangdong Lang Deng Garment Co., Ltd. said: "those points of extensive and low technological content should shrink even if they shrink. Those who only value our cheap labor force should let it go.

It is not terrible to lose this. As long as we can upgrade the industry, improve the efficiency of the utilization of resources, increase the added value of the product, and pform the traditional manufacturing industry into advanced manufacturing, we can improve the core of the industry.

Some entrepreneurs believe that "Lewis turning point" is a good opportunity to form a healthy labor market system.

Chen Lifen, chairman of Jiangsu sunshine group, said on the one hand, the shortage of labor force is actually a shortage of peasant workers' rights. In fact, the shortage of migrant workers is actually a shortage of rights or a shortage of system. We need to do more work in protecting the rights of migrant workers. On the other hand, we should strengthen the supply of education, especially the supply of vocational skills, improve the quality and level of labor, and meet the needs of the industrial market after upgrading.

According to industry experts, the "Lewis turning point" appeared, which made the labor shortage in the Yangtze River Delta and the Pearl River Delta advanced 20 years, and particularly reminded that when the eastern region implements the textile industry pfer, the adjustment must be moderate, so as to prevent too many labor-intensive enterprises from closing down, resulting in the re emergence of a large surplus of labor force, that is, the turning point of "Lewis turning point".

This will adversely affect industrial development and social stability.

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In this regard, Zhou Sheng, chairman of Shenzhen Yi Hui group, believes that the effective way to deal with rising labor costs is to develop high-end industries with high-end talents.

China's textile and garment enterprises can consider upgrading locally, developing their own brands and high added value.

However, we must give priority to the fact that due to the high demand for human capital, enterprises must make corresponding adjustments and improvements in terms of innovation environment and cultural system.

Will labor-intensive industries lose their edge?

Since 2010, the shortage of labor in China has become very prominent.

According to the calculation of relevant departments, the wages of low-end workers rose by nearly 40% in 2010, and will continue to rise at an annual rate of 20%~30% in the next three or four years.

In fact, China has not yet reached the absolute shortage of migrant workers, but the flow of migrant workers has changed.

In 2005, 70.3% of migrant workers moved to the coastal areas, 14.4% and 15% in the central and western regions respectively.

In 2009, with the relocation of factory production lines and infrastructure projects, there were many new employment opportunities in the Midwest, attracting 17% and 20.3% of the total number of migrant workers, while the proportion of migrant workers in eastern China decreased to 62.5%.

At the same time, the domestic demand market, especially the service industry, is very hot. It has a strong demand for low-end workers and has taken away a group of workers from the coastal manufacturing industry.

At the same time, the price of agricultural products has increased, and there are also a large number of migrant workers who stay at home.

In short, before the "Lewis turning point", it is people who want to work, and there will be endless labor force if they do not raise their salaries. After the emergence of "Lewis turning point", they are seeking help from work, and no suitable employees can be found without raising wages.

After the Spring Festival this year, there was a serious shortage of workers in both the coastal areas and the mainland.

Among them, the employment gap in the Pearl River Delta region of Guangdong amounted to 2 million.

There are about 12 million migrant workers in large provinces and migrant workers in Anhui province.

Local entrepreneurs believe that the "demographic dividend" of China's economic development is drying up. Labor shortage is becoming a common phenomenon in the mainland. The traditional labor intensive industries will accelerate the loss of labor cost advantage.

The "labor shortage" in the large province of migrant workers can be regarded as a signal of "Lewis turning point" in the labor market.

In the interview, enterprises still have another view on this phenomenon. They believe that "labor shortage" does not mean that the traditional labor intensive industries will lose their advantages.

Not to mention that the wage level of China's manufacturing industry is still less than that of the US 1/10, the relative price advantage of the labor force will not be lost immediately; let alone the total labor force in China is huge. There is a prediction that there are still 970 million people in 2030, larger than the total amount now, and the ratio of labour force to the total population in the country is about 67%, which is still higher than that of most developed countries.

For these two points, Cai Fang, director of the Institute of population and labor economics of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, made a more authoritative judgement. He said that although it can be asserted that "Lewis turning point" has emerged, China's advantages in labor supply will remain for a long time.

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Solving the inflection point with reasonable industrial policies

In the interview with the author, the heads of some export enterprises said that from the international experience, a country should avoid the premature occurrence of capital deepening in the early stage of the "Lewis turning point". It should ensure that the rich non skilled labor force can be maximally utilized through the innovation of the labor force utilization tendency. Only when the surplus labor situation does not exist and the real wages begin to increase substantially, will the capital deepen after the shallow growth of capital.

This is the successful experience of Japan.

The proportion of our agricultural population in the total population is quite large, and the proportion of agricultural labor force in the total employed population is more than 50%. This reality determines that the "Lewis turning point" will be a long-term process in our country.

It also determines that in the long term, our country can not abandon the labor-intensive industrial development strategy. Instead, we should innovate the use of labor force and increase the level of industrial absorption of labor according to the changes in the international industry.

As chairman of the National People's Congress, Chen Lifen, chairman of Jiangsu sunshine group, has studied this economic phenomenon. She believes that the biggest change brought by "Lewis turning point" is that enterprises should make more efforts in technical content and brand building, and only rely on industrial upgrading to solve difficult problems.

First, the pformation of labor force. The government should increase labor training, improve human capital, adjust the structure of labor force, improve the employment skills of labor force through the development of technical education and vocational education, which not only conforms to the principle of fairness, but also accords with market principles.

Two, enterprises should improve labor productivity and carry out technological innovation. Even labor-intensive enterprises are promising. The work of the past two people can be accomplished by means of technology.

Chen Lifen said: "from the experience point of view, if the emergence of" Lewis inflection point "is the result of the full selection of the market, an economy will inevitably breed a group of innovative entrepreneurs, open up more new industries, and play the role of accumulating talents and improving the overall quality of products.

In the process of pformation and upgrading, enterprises have a unique vision, and when they see that the advantages of labor no longer exist, they will develop their own new direction.

Japan also made money by labor-intensive industries before the 60s of last century. After the economic take-off, labor shortage began and workers demanded higher wages, which is similar to the situation in China.

When Japan faces "Lewis turning point", many concrete practices of the government can be used for reference.

I learned from the interview that China is very much like Japan in the 60s of last century.

At that time, in order to solve the "labor shortage", Japan increased investment in equipment to capital intensive pfer, and Japanese banks provided loans and investment in technological innovation, so that small and medium-sized enterprises rapidly split up.

At that time, some small and medium enterprises laid the foundation for becoming an international company.

For example, the Sony Corp rose in the 60s of the last century, and bought the American radio patent technology for improvement. Walkman was born, and so did CASIO calculators.

In short, the Japanese economy successfully pformed in the 60s of last century, and the vitality of small and medium-sized enterprises doubled, and the profit rate was even higher than that of large enterprises.

What should we learn from Japan's successful experience in the face of the "Lewis turning point" that has puzzled domestic textile enterprises?