@Geogramatt: "Why the rush? Let this generation pass peacefully. The young all want to leave anyway."

I would think that it makes China look bad (and that's what the leadership cares, despite what their actions sometimes come through as), if there are so many elder people left behind in undeveloped rural homes.

Combine this with left behind children, who often are seen sharing those poor living conditions with their grandparents (if even that).. If the elderly are migrated to better housing closer to even minimal services, then so would their grandchildren - and that's for the future, right now.

As of late, Chinese pro-party commentators have repeatedly mentioned that Deng never said that it is glorious to be rich for everyone - they argue that Deng always meant for select few to become rich first, and rest later.

If much of China growth, or at least opening the potential to it, can be attributed to reforms that Deng initiated, then just as much of the so-called economic injustice (or relative poverty) can be attributed to those same political decisions - not so much people unintentionally falling off the wagon of development and economic prosperity, as is case in some western countries.

Secondly, the culture of shared poverty being the glorious thing (that the previous generations were forced to), would not have disappeared over night.

I have witnessed the internal conflict in some elderly rural residents in Yunnan, torn between being angry for not getting to enjoy the fruits of China's growth on one hand, and not accepting the steps that would be needed to pick the fruits on the other hand.

I was at a rural funeral in Yunnan last autumn, and throughout the event there was a bookkeeper registering and writing down all donations.'

Back then I understood that the family had purchased the feast for a certain price, and this communal bookkeeper was subtracting the payment for that from all those donations.

But in light of this article, I wouldn't be surprised if he served some administrative role as well.

Chinese state does have some economic muscle, and tradition of state-owned enterprising. I think that the state should jump in here.

They could confistace this kind of non-monetary resources (like bricks, or frozen french fries), pay market price to the employees, and then sell the goods back to the market (or donate to charity) through it's own channels.

But I guess there is more bucks in cigarattes and oil.

@alienew: "drive investors to go to places where they can get away"

Well, technically it would drive them away to places where they can get away with unpaid wages in some other ways than being beaten to death.

Preferably the alternative would be a more civilized way to lose face than doing so concretically.

The process somewhere else would be that after 1-2 months salary is unpaid, the employees quit and contact union, which then more or less peacefully negotiates the best possible solution between the employer and the employee.

The workers can then choose better representatives, if the union-led negotiations still produce nothing but bricks as compensation for unpaid wages.

The problem in China is that if you quit, there are 10 other guys waiting to take your position regardless of how you were dealt with.

But in that scale, there is usually just 1 guy offering those positions, and if he or she is dealt with this way, there may not be another guy taking his place.