As someone who was also born in a small fourth-tier city in Heilongjiang, I really can't be more familiar with the city of Hegang. So I'll talk about my observations and understanding of Hegang.
Hegang was a very good small city in the 1980s and early 1990s, and is a relatively famous coal city in the three northeastern provinces and even in the country. Relying on the local coal resources, the people of the small city of Daqing, the richest city in Heilongjiang at the time, although not as good as, but the local people in a corner of the world is also considered rich.
The industry here is mainly based on coal mining and processing. The residents are also concentrated in a few large state-owned coal companies. In the 1990s, a 70- to 80-square-meter house cost about 50,000 to 60,000 yuan. Of course, this price is also considered to be the center of the local area.
But with the gradual depletion of local coal resources in Hegang, coupled with the reform of state-owned enterprises in the 1990s, many of the former employees of state-owned enterprises have taken the initiative to move out of the area. A lot of the original state-owned enterprise workers or active or passive left the original work unit, began to choose their own road. But this is not a good way to go, and those who came out soon realized that the economic model that the city had been developing for decades was now unsustainable, and that a large number of people could no longer rely on the coal-related industries for re-employment. But there are no other industries in the city where freelancers can make a living. The city's economy has been on the rise since 2000, with a large number of local people choosing to leave Hegang for larger cities, mostly the capital of Heilongjiang province, and then the majority of people choosing to go to the southern coastal cities.
After two decades, the people who left Hegang in the early 2000s have settled in other cities, and their lives are undoubtedly better than Hegang's current city, and the people who left have been reluctant to go back. Of course, not only their own, including their children, the ability to take the old man from the Hegang also came to the city where they now live, so the gradual loss of population Hegang, the city more and more into an unnoticed "dead city".
Now most of the people who stay in Hegang are in the small part of the state-owned enterprises and institutions, or some of the supporting service industry engaged in personnel. However, the overall trend is that of an aging population with a low level of education. The whole city has no innovation capacity, and the local industry has not introduced any new industries to settle down after decades. Local wages are generally low, with an average monthly wage of around 1,500 RMB. The average monthly wage is about 1500 RMB, which is not enough to meet the purchasing power and demand of the local people. The good thing is that local goods are cheap. The price of food is about a quarter of the price of a comparable city in the south of the country.
House is even cheaper, most as long as there is no need to buy, here to live in the local or resident population have a house, and many are two or three sets. And the north of the house than the south of the house, itself is there is the cost of ownership, mainly in addition to the community property costs, or the annual winter heating costs. Take an 80 square meter house, the annual heating fee is about 2000 yuan. Even if you don't live, you still have to pay. Think about who would like to buy such a set of not earn money, put in the hands of the house also lose money for investment.
If there are many reasons why houses in Hegang are cheap, the root cause is that the local economy is too poor. It lacks the vitality of production and consumption that a city should have. At the same time the problem can not be solved for a long time, thus the situation becomes worse and worse. Of course, the 15,000 dollar house that the woman in the news report bought is a special case. I understand that the main reason is the location of the house in the local area of Hegang is also relatively poor, and it is also an apartment house. In the central area of Hegang City, the average house price is now about 3000-4000, a set down two or three hundred thousand is also very normal. But there is a relatively serious phenomenon of price without market. But this house price is still very competitive compared to other southern cities Crane.
Now Hegang's house so much public attention to the reason in the words of the netizen: "Now life is too difficult, in the community to fight for a few years, they are really struck, but also more recognized their own. Since I can't roll others, I want to see if there is any good place to lie down and spend the rest of my life. Undoubtedly this one or two million house price of the small city is indeed very attractive, but I still have to advise you here, such a small city just come to be able to lie down more easily, but a long time you will find that here lying is not comfortable, because there is no suitable for young people to have the development of jobs, your life will not be able to continue. And the whole city's decadent atmosphere makes it easy for you to stay for a long time and never get up again.
With China's economy ushering in new changes, there are more and more small cities in the fourth and fifth tiers of economic development that will join the ranks of Hegang. With cities such as Shuangyashan and Jixi very close to Hegang, we already seem to be seeing an increasing concentration of population in the heart of the big cities that are doing well economically in the future. Although Hegang seems to be a bit of a laggard today, it is only a microcosm and a symbol of the development of a country's cities. No one wants the city they live in to slowly be Hegangized.