Analysis: Property Crisis Pushes Major Cities to Make It Easier to Get Local Residency

Widening access to government services like medicine and education will also boost transition to consumption-oriented growth, experts say

Overlooking Hangzhou, Zhejiang province on May 31, 2020. Photo: VCG

Some of China’s major cities have become the latest to make it easier for migrants to acquire local residency, driven by multiple pressures including stagnant population growth, slumping consumption and the country’s property crisis.

Since the start of this year, at least eight cities with over 5 million long-term residents — mostly in the economic powerhouses of the Yangtze River Delta and Pearl River Delta — have lowered residency thresholds.