Chinese New Year Is World’s Biggest Human Migration • Hacker News Board

Re: Chinese New Year Is World’s Biggest Human Migration

#11

Post by max76 » Mon, Feb 04, 2019, 5:02 AM UTC

bobthepanda wrote: post #8

max76 wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The 1.5 bilion people number seems fishy to me, because that's slightly larger than the total population of China. EDIT: The official and current UN number is 1.42B. China's last official count was 1.35B in January 2013.

If you're a couple heading home, you may need to travel three times to be with two sets of family. You might also need to travel multiple times to have a traditional meal at the family home, and then go somewhere else for an actual vacation getaway. Enough edge cases and the numbers could work out. Also the metric is trips , not people; if you live in some provincial village out in the country you may need to take mu…

I agree with the 2.99 billion trips, assuming some definitions for trip. My parent comment mentioned 1.5b people, which I do not agree with.

Re: Chinese New Year Is World’s Biggest Human Migration

#12

Post by justicezyx » Mon, Feb 04, 2019, 5:12 AM UTC

See the reactions to this post and those from PH Internet usage. I just cannot ignore the stark stereotype contrast...

Re: Chinese New Year Is World’s Biggest Human Migration

#13

Post by cjohansson » Mon, Feb 04, 2019, 5:15 AM UTC

Wow this must be tough on the climate

Re: Chinese New Year Is World’s Biggest Human Migration

#14

Post by nsedlet » Mon, Feb 04, 2019, 5:35 AM UTC

I highly recommend the documentary Last Train Home. It follows a Chinese family - the parents leave their children in their rural village to go off in search of work. They make the annual trip back to see them for Chinese New Year.

The film captures the awesome scale of the migration and its cultural importance, as well as the social impact of China's urbanization. It's really devastating.

Re: Chinese New Year Is World’s Biggest Human Migration

#15

Post by odajay » Mon, Feb 04, 2019, 5:38 AM UTC

nsedlet wrote: post #14

I highly recommend the documentary Last Train Home. It follows a Chinese family - the parents leave their children in their rural village to go off in search of work. They make the annual trip back to see them for Chinese New Year. The film captures the awesome scale of the migration and its cultural importance, as well as the social impact of China's urbanization. It's really devastating.

I have seen this documentary a few years ago and still think about it on a monthly basis or whenever someone refers about Chinese workers. Really impactful.

Re: Chinese New Year Is World’s Biggest Human Migration

#16

Post by Hithredin » Mon, Feb 04, 2019, 5:46 AM UTC

JDiculous wrote: post #10

In other news, protests in Hong Kong over Chinese tourists. "We don’t want your money: Chinese shoppers told to spend cash elsewhere by frustrated Hongkongers who just want some peace and quiet" https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/hong-kong-economy/articl... Also, Bloomberg is really the worst with clickbait titles.

Haters everywhere. Hong Kong is not really the best place for peace and quiet. Like... really

Re: Chinese New Year Is World’s Biggest Human Migration

#17

Post by azurezyq » Mon, Feb 04, 2019, 5:57 AM UTC

JDiculous wrote: post #10

In other news, protests in Hong Kong over Chinese tourists. "We don’t want your money: Chinese shoppers told to spend cash elsewhere by frustrated Hongkongers who just want some peace and quiet" https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/hong-kong-economy/articl... Also, Bloomberg is really the worst with clickbait titles.

peace and quiet... HK? Well, haters take their own shares. However HK cannot make money from peace and quiet to make it sustainable.

According to Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_Hong_Kong#GDP[45]), Tourism is 5% of the GDP and I believe a big chunk of that is contributed by people from mainland.

Re: Chinese New Year Is World’s Biggest Human Migration

#18

Post by azurezyq » Mon, Feb 04, 2019, 6:07 AM UTC

maxander wrote: post #5

> The government expects 2.99 billion journeys to take place over the holiday, an increase of 0.6 percent from the previous year [...] So assuming most are taking a trip somewhere and a trip back, that's about 1.5 billion people involved in this phenomenon, somehow or another- roughly 1 out of every 5 humans on the planet!

China is a very diverse country and has a good amount of rural residents. To reach these towns, a hub-and-spokes model is followed, which added more trips per person.

Re: Chinese New Year Is World’s Biggest Human Migration

#19

Post by s1mon » Mon, Feb 04, 2019, 6:09 AM UTC

This Wendover Productions video "Why China Is so Good at Building Railways" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0JDoll8OEFE also explains a lot about how things have changed recently to make this migration even more possible in China. They've built so much high speed rail in the last decade that they now have more than the rest of the world, combined. Hong Kong to Beijing is under 9 hours, while comparable distances in other parts of the world are over 40 hours.

Re: Chinese New Year Is World’s Biggest Human Migration

#20

Post by jimmydef » Mon, Feb 04, 2019, 6:23 AM UTC

cjohansson wrote: post #13

Wow this must be tough on the climate

Actually, I would think everyone travelling during one period of the year is better for the climate than the alternative which is people going back to their hometowns uniformly throughout the year. Going back together would mean that trains/buses/etc are all at full capacity so it's way more efficient CO2/energy wise per person mile travelled.