How youth power is driving China's national growth

Editor's note: Liu Mengling is an opinion editor with CGTN. The article reflects the author's opinions and not necessarily the views of CGTN.

May 4 marks China's Youth Day, a moment to celebrate energy, ambition and evolving role of young people in the country's development.

As Chinese President Xi Jinping stated in a reply note to representatives of youth honor recipients, young Chinese are encouraged to integrate their personal aspirations into the bigger picture of national development. This is not merely an appeal, but a reflection of reality – today's youth are increasingly shaping how China grows, innovates and adapts.

In recent Western media discussions, labels such as "lying flat" have attracted attention as a shorthand for understanding this generation. Yet to take such labels at face value is to miss the larger picture. Today's young Chinese are not defined by a single narrative, but by their capacity to adapt and forge new paths in a rapidly changing society.

Not retreat, but adaption

To begin with,China's younger generation has come of age amid rapid technological changes, decades of sustained economic growth, and constant digital connectivity – conditions markedly different from those faced by previous generations.

As a member of China's post-90s generation myself, I recognize these labels like "lying flat," so readily interpreted in Western narratives as resignation, instead as tools of self-reflection. Through humor and self-deprecation, this generation is actively adapting to pressure, reassessing life choices, and experimenting with more flexible, personalized pathways to success. This is not retreat, but adaption – and it speaks less to loss of ambition than to a generation learning how to endure, re-calibrate, and move on its own terms.

Flexible work, hard innovation

Nowhere is such re-calibration clearer than in employment.

With new business forms and models proliferating, thanks to the accelerated integration of digital and real economies, "freelancer" has emerged as a preferred career choice for China's Gen Z. By the end of 2022, over 200 million young people were engaged in flexible employment, a shift that has become an artery of China's innovation ecosystem rather than a makeshift.

Such transformation is vital in reducing skill mismatches, broadening career entry points, offering more diverse job options, and allowing talent to flow more efficiently toward high-growth sectors.

The evidence is tangible. From DeepSeek – one of China's AI pioneers, powered by fewer than 140 young engineers and researchers, many of them recent graduates from universities – to "Black Myth: Wukong," a globally acclaimed video game developed by a team dominated by Gen Z talents, these ventures thrive not despite flexible employment and independent entrepreneurship, but precisely because of them. They demonstrate how such new models can concentrate talent, shorten innovation cycles and efficiently translate creative ideas into globally competitive products.

Less waste, more value

Western claims of "consumption downgrading" sit equally uneasily with the actual spending power of China's young adults.

China's 1995–2009 cohort – nearly 260 million people – makes up less than 20% of the population, yet contributes about 40% of national consumption. Their spending power is projected to reach 16 trillion yuan (about $2.28 trillion) by 2035, positioning them as the primary engine of consumer growth in the decade ahead.

Beyond sheer volume, young Chinese are reshaping consumption patterns rather than retreating. Data from "Double 11" shopping festival in recent years show that young consumers are moving away from the "whatever is cheap" mindset to "whatever I like," prioritizing personal preference, quality and experience over price alone.

This shift is already generating economic momentum. By 2026, China's designer toy economy is projected to reach 110.1 billion yuan (approximately $15.6 billion), with annual growth exceeding 20%. Globally, the trend is spreading. According to China's General Administration of Customs, China exported over 47 billion yuan (about $6.5 billion) worth of dolls and animal toys in 2024, including brands such as Pop Mart, with over two-thirds destined for major markets such as the US, the European Union, and Japan.

Western commentary often frames Chinese youngsters' declining interest in big-ticket items, paired with rising spending on milk tea and blind-box toys, as evidence of low-cost emotional gratification. This interpretation misses the point. What is occurring is not "downgrading," but rational re-prioritizing. Spending on interest-driven consumption actually reflects long-term investment in quality of life and self-identity – sectors boasting strong growth potential.

Young hands, heavy responsibility

Far from being disengaged, China's youth are increasingly assuming central roles in social development, scientific research and global competition.

From 2012 to the end of 2022, 12.2 million young people returned to, or settled in, China's rural areas to start businesses, with the figure expected to exceed 15 million by the end of 2025. Compared with traditional farmers, these returnee entrepreneurs bring higher educational attainment, stronger professional skills and greater capacity to integrate modern management, technology and business models into agriculture. Statistics show that modern agricultural projects led by university graduates raise land productivity by an average of 40%, further evincing the fact that youth participation is transforming China's countryside.

In frontier science and technology, the generational shift is even more pronounced. About 59% of young scientists in today's global artificial intelligence (AI) field are based in China and the US, with China's share more than double that of the United States.

This demographic advantage has translated into real innovation capacity. Today, across major national science and technology projects, research teams are strikingly young: The Beidou Navigation Satellite System team has an average age of 35, and so does the team behind the "Lunar Palace" space habitat project; the Shenzhou crewed space program and the Chang'e lunar missions, both average just 33 years of age... The list goes on and on. By contrast, NASA reports an average age of 45.8 among its scientists and engineers, with only 24% under 40.

Youthfulness, in China's case, has become a strategic asset: More and more complex and high-stake technological missions are entrusted to an exceptionally young generation who are confident, highly trained and capable of delivering frontier results.

On the global stage, the confidence and competence are equally visible. At the 2024 Paris Olympic Games, China's post-2000s athletes stood out for their composure and ease, winning nine of the country's 11 gold medals.

"Lying flat" or rising fast?

Taken together, these realities lay bare how purposefully distorted Western portrayal of Chinese youth is.

For all the Western hand-wringing over "lying flat" Chinese youth, the facts tell another story: Far from drifting at the margins of society, China's younger generation is steadily becoming its backbone by driving innovation, reshaping consumption, and contributing to social progress on multiple fronts. And China, with the world's second-largest youth population, stands as an exemplar of how youth power can truly shape the future.

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