Young shifting mindset
Updated: 2014-10-17 07:10
By Agnes Lu in Hong Kong(HK Edition)
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It would take a typical household 14 years, without any meals, to save up enough money to buy a 400-square-foot flat in Kowloon, compared with five years of savings 12 years ago, according to the Chinese University of Hong Kong's latest Quality of Life Index.
The housing affordability ratio has also hit its lowest since the index was first compiled last year.
At the same time, local home prices have continued to go through the roof, hitting new records in August. The Rating and Valuation Department said the monthly price index for private homes rose for the fourth straight month in July. Centaline Property Agency's Centa-City Leading Index (CCL) suggests that Hong Kong has entered the second property price rise cycle.
But the situation for youths has not improved. Although the proportion of youths having attended post-secondary education increased 19.8 percent from 2001 to 2011, their median monthly income in 2011 remained at HK$8,000, the same as it was a decade ago, as suggested by the Hong Kong 2011 Population Census Thematic Report: Youths, compiled by the Census and Statistics Department last year.
The report said more than 60 percent of the youths were working as clerical support, service and sales workers.
The 2011 population census also suggests that the proportion of never married for male and female in the prime marriageable ages (those aged 20-49) increased by 7.5 percent and 0.4 percent, respectively, from 2001 to 2011.
Apart from the facts mentioned, Professor Eddie Hui Chi-man of Hong Kong Polytechnic University's Department of Building and Real Estate believes that the huge rise in the number of young individual public rental housing (PRH) applicants also reveals the shifting mindset of new social startups.
"The traditional Hong Kong belief in hard work and success may have gradually made way for a more conservative attitude towards an unpredictable future, while the fear of lack of opportunities and inability to afford marriage and mortgages has begun to haunt the younger generation," he said.
Hui proposed building more public housing estates at a sustainable speed and developing a mechanism to conduct regular asset reviews. The Housing Authority says it will step up efforts to boost land supply in the short, medium and long terms to help meet the demand for public housing.
agnes@chinadailyhk.com
(HK Edition 10/17/2014 page9)