China Cracks Down on Costly ‘Bride Price’ Custom to Boost Falling Birth Rate
- Women can command high cash payments due to gender imbalance
- Experts say only fixing gender inequality can boost birth rate
This article is for subscribers only.
China’s latest attempt at boosting its flagging birth rate is a crackdown on an expensive wedding custom. Few people — including officials themselves — expect the measure to make a difference.
Betrothal gift, or caili, is a tradition where the groom-to-be pays a “bride price” to the woman’s family to demonstrate his sincerity and wealth, while also compensating them for raising a daughter in a country that has long favored sons. Almost three-quarters of marriages in China involve the custom, according to a survey of 1,846 residents conducted by Tencent News in 2020. Families could be expected to pay tens of thousands of dollars, multiples of their annual income.