Cultural Consumption Boom.docVIP

Cultural Consumption Boom 　　A love story was sparked when Chen Linxiao and Ning Chengfang first met 36 years ago in the dusty corridors of a Beijing bookstore. 　　The couple， born in the 1960s， had been searching for the same book throughout the city one day， but found more than what they had bargained for by the end of the day. Chen had just claimed the only copy of the book he was looking for at a store and was about to exit when he was confronted by the then-stranger， Ning. Although she pleaded to buy the book off his hands， Chen Linxiao refused， instead offering to lend it to her. 　　Thanks to that book， their relationship blossomed， eventually leading to marriage. 　　“Nowadays， many young people maybe wouldn’t understand our feelings toward books at that time，” Chen said. “In the early 1980s， books were rare. A significant number of people were hungry for books.” 　　Now， as people’s living standard increases， the demand for cultural products has also surged. Cultural consumption can improve people’s quality of life and make people happier， claimed Chen. 　　The couple enjoys reading， watching movies， plays and other forms of creative arts. They have even formed the habit of going to cinema during the Chinese New Year holiday， contributing to the country’s astronomical box-office records during that period. 　　 New growth engine 　　Data from the National Bureau of Statistics shows that from 2011 to 2014， the percapita average cultural and entertainment consumption of both rural and urban residents had increased by more than 12 percent annually. 　　In 2014， China’s per-capita average GDP exceeded $7，000， and residents were purchasing more cultural products. 　　In that year， Chinese residents’ average spending per capita increased by 9.6 percent nominally whereas their average consumption per capita on culture and entertainment rose by 16.4 percent， as revealed through a sampling survey conducted by the National Bureau of Statistics on 160，000 residents in 31