Despite ambitious targets in China’s First Five-Year Plan (1953–1957), what major economic challenge persisted throughout the 1950s and 1960s?

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BlackTom AI · Accepted Answer

The question asks to identify the major economic challenge that persisted throughout the 1950s and 1960s despite ambitious targets in China’s First Five-Year Plan (1953–1957).
Option a: Inflation from consumer goods markets destabilised economic policy. While price pressures existed, the dominant historiographic emphasis during this period is not persistent inflation as the core obstacle to the plan’s success; rather, the systemic inefficiencies and misallocations are highlighted as the central long-term issue.
Option b: China’s trade surplus ballooned, undermining the planned economy. In the early PRC period, trade policy and balance of payments were important, but the description of a ballooning trade surplus undermining the plan does not align with the well-documented persistence of internal inefficiencies and misallocation that hampered growth. A large surplus of that nature is not the standard characterization of the era’s main economic hurdle.
Option c: Labour mobility increased, disrupting collectivised industries. In fact, labour mobility tended to be constrained rather than freely fluid under collectivisation, and while disruptions could occur, this is not typically cited as the fundamental ongoing problem of the period. The literature emphasizes structural planning and incentive problems rather than mobility shocks as the defining persistent challenge.
Option d: Resource misallocation and productivity inefficiencies remained widespread. This is the key issue repeatedly highlighted by scholars: despite centralized planning and targets, misallocation of scarce inputs, duplication of effort, weak incentives, and low productivity persisted, undermining the effectiveness of the Five-Year Plan and the rapid industrialization drive.
Therefore, the most accurate choice is the option that points to broad misallocation and inefficiencies in productivity as the enduring problem, reflecting the core structural weakness of the planned economy in that era.

ECX2630 - ECX5630 - WS-01 2025 Quiz #1 - Preliminary Topic, Topics 1 and 2 (DUE: SAT 21 JUN @ 11:55pm Melb. Time)

Despite ambitious targets in China’s First Five-Year Plan (1953–1957), what major economic challenge persisted throughout the 1950s and 1960s?

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