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Thread: Economic State of Shaolin Temple today

  1. #1

    Economic State of Shaolin Temple today

    Accounts from those who have been there point to alot of poverty. In fact, several KFM articles mention this. This is the thread to discuss it.

  2. #2
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    From my experiences there are 4 broad groups of locals:

    1 - the Shaolin (DengFeng) rural population - poor

    2 - the population working in the martial arts sector (teaching, running schools, etc) or related businesses (equipment, uniforms, students transport, travel agencies, etc) - doing much better than most rural Chinese

    3 - the "management" (government and tourism officials, big school owners, ... all the way to the abbot) - doing very well even by western standards

    4 - the students - they come from all over China and range from very poor to quite comfortable, depending on their family

    So IMO overall Shaolin business has certainly had a fantastic impact on the economics of the region and the living standards of most of the locals, creating lots of jobs and bringing lots of $$$ that otherwise would have never been spent / invested in Henan.

    Wall
    > it is your mind, that creates this world >

  3. #3
    Hows about your run-of-the-mill monk? I've heard they don't do so well. And then there are also the monks-in-training. Again, I hear about lots of poverty with them.

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    Isn't this like asking how real mice are doing at Disney World?

  5. #5
    Poverty Levels in Henan Countryside…US$200 / year

    Henan has a population of about 100mn people. About 80mn are farmers. They are very poor with an average household income of Rmb1600 per year. That is US$200 a year, or 17 dollars a month. (Data Source: China National Bureau of Statistics – June 2006)


    Shaolin Temple Earnings…over US$20mn / year

    Gate ticket earnings:
    - About 1,500,000 tourists / year @ US$5 / ticket = US$7.5mn
    - The temple gets about 25% of that, or just under US$2mn

    Shaolin performances:
    - 60 countries a year, over 1000 performances a year
    - The troupe earns about US$10,000 each performance, at 1000 performances
    - That is about US$10mn

    Performances (Feng Zhong Shaolin)
    - Originally performed at the Beijing Ballete Concert Hall and now throughout China
    - Earned them about US$8mn in 2005

    In total that is roughly US$20mn a year

    On a side note the Deng Feng municipality alone has already generated over US$100mn in tourist dollar revenue ending July 2006 – obviously most of it attributed to the Shaolin temple and its surrounding wushu schools.

    There is no doubt that the success of the Shaolin temple has had little impact if any on the overall living standards and conditions of the peasant farmers and small factory workers in the Dengfeng municipality. There are over 600,000 of them. Citizens still have limited access to very minimum standards of education and medical care. Factory layoffs and unemployment are high, while umemployment insurance and pensions are virtually nonesistant.

    Anyone who tells you that the Shaolin temple is pumping money directly into the local economy to help the Dengfeng citizens are pulling your leg. Shaolin revenues are no doubt going into the devleopment of more tourist related business models and real estate investment projects, while government revenues are going into industrial infrastructure devleopment.

    Now you know why when fat cat spiritual leaders like Shi Yongxin recieve cars from local government departments that it enrages local citizens.

    And I do stand corrected….Shi Yongxin already does have an MBA.



    Sources:
    http://cme.ce.cn/left/rw/200604/16/t..._6715211.shtml
    http://www.zynews.com/2006-08/15/content_415084.htm
    Last edited by bungbukuen; 08-30-2006 at 08:06 AM.

  6. #6
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    Bungbukuen, you are partly incorrect.

    Many people at Shaolin (DengFeng), many of the people I've known personally, have substantially increased their earnings, and now support their otherwise very poor families, thanks to Shaolin.

    They have transformed themselves from sons and daughters of poor peasant farmers and small factory workers to tourist guides, kungfu instructors, taxi drivers, weapons and equipment sellers, hotel staff, shop and restaurant operators, etc.

    Note that I'm not saying that the Shaolin temple is pumping money directly into the local economy to help the Dengfeng citizens, I am saying that the Shaolin business and tourism boom is having huge positive fallout effets on the local population.

    The boosting in local spending and investment by millions of non-local and foreign people impact the economy on a macro level, regardless of the local re-investment, or lack of, by Shaolin itself.

    In simple terms: if all of a sudden millions of extra people spend millions of extra dollars in your town, directly or indirectly it will have a positive economic impact on the whole town and most people living in it

    Wall

    NB. this is all relevant to the DengFeng and surrounding area only; the rest of Henan obviously derives no tangible macroeconomic benefit from the Shaolin boom, and so remains a very depressed chinese rural region.

    PS for The Xia: the 'monks in training' are students, and as such how well they are doing financially mostly depends on their families earnings (usually they come from peasant families so they are not doing so well). The 'run of the mill monks' as you call them usually are doing pretty well by local standards; they have basic teaching or performing salaries which they augment with teaching to foreigners or other "entrepreneurial" activities, and thus overall are doing better than most young people in Henan (keeping in mind that Henan standards are a low starting point).
    Last edited by wall; 09-01-2006 at 07:28 AM.
    > it is your mind, that creates this world >

  7. #7
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    Again, keep this in perspective. This is China.

    I remember when they were building the Tamo statue above the cave. Laborers would carry a block of stone up the tortuous mountain trail from the Nunnery on their backs - it was brutal, hard work. They worked at dawn and dusk, when light was poor, because it was way too hot to attempt when the sun was high. These stones were easily 75-100 lbs. I know because I tried to lift one with the mistaken idea that I'd contribute to this great task. They were paid the equivalent of $0.25 a stone. And they were happy about that. That was good money for that amount of work for them.

    In Henan, there are still cave dwellers. In fact, some of them aren't that far from Shaolin. Many rural Chinese live very poorly - ramshackle dwelling, dirt floors, no electricity or plumbing. There are some extremely poor areas of China. Shaolin isn't one of them anymore. It's one of the most affluent temples in China now, so of course there's considerable trickle-down. Remember the forced relocation? That was a huge shakedown and many of the migrant poor who made their living hawking crap in front of the temple were sent on. Most relocated to Baimasi, which is the next most popular tourist temple in the area. But if you want to see poverty near a temple, check out the beggars in front of some of the smaller ones. Visit Guanlinsi and pay your respects. The poor there will break your heart.
    Gene Ching
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    They have a documentary called Shaolin Ulysses that talks about some of the monks that came to the U.S. and covers a little bit of history from where the Shaolin temple was around 4 monks to where it grew so now there are 18,000+ students.

    One of the boys who came over, they talk to his family, mom and dad and sister, and they said they lived in a cave when they first were married, and show the cave.

    The sister does taiji because she was a girl she was not allowed to be a monk like her brother. It was extremely sad the frustration on her face as she did the taiji form and the fact that she can't make as much money as her brother because he is a monk and is in the U.S., and she isn't, all just because she's a girl.

    Equally sad was the fact that her taiji wasn't the best ... it really made me want to go over to China and give her lessons and bring her and her parents back to the U.S., but I don't know how I could do that. Anyway if every poor person from China came over here it would cause a breakdown of civil services in this country.

    Anyway overall the suffering and poverty in the world caused by overpopulation and lack of infrastructure around the world is extremely sad.

  9. #9
    Wall – it is completely preposterous to imply that the majority of inhabitants of the Dengfeng municipality are somehow poverty free, or even operating at levels near minimum international poverty line standards. The reality of it is that Dengfeng is also an impoverished region, so I do not know why you try to candy coat this matter. It is insensitive and a real slap in the face to the poor peasant farmers.

    Granted the 83 odd wushu schools in Dengfeng (teaching 50,000 students) brought in a cool Rmb500mn in 2005, or US$60mn. Undoubtedly this has created some isolated opportunities for local citizens to get ahead, and I am very happy for those who have improved the quality of their lives and their families. But the large majority of benefits go directly to business and government - not Joe Blow.

    For the majority of the 600,000 people living in Dengfeng, the overall quality of living standards in terms of income levels, education, medical / healthcare, unemployment insurance, pensions, etc…, are far below international poverty line standards, and therefore is simply blissful ignorance to think that the tourist “boom is having huge positive fallout effects on the local population”.
    Last edited by bungbukuen; 08-31-2006 at 11:06 AM.

  10. #10
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    The father of one of the monks in the U.S. is some kind of instructor at Shaolin, and the sister teaches taiji as well, and from the pictures of their house, they have the bare minimum, a phone, some old appliances, small dwelling, nothing fancy at all.

  11. #11
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    Shaolin Ulysses, eh?

    Have you seen Shaolin Ulysses? Take a close look at the credits.

    As for Dengfeng, if your talking about the city of Dengfeng, it's not so bad. If your talking about the region - the county - well, that's a different story. I think there are 13 areas in Dengfeng county and some are rather poor. Like I said, there are still cave dwellers nearby.

    In regards to lunghushan's reference, the monk you are refering to is Zhang Lipeng (aka Shi Xingpeng). He was featured on the cover of our 2002 Shaolin Special (Jan/Feb). His sister, Zhang Meimei, was our got qi master for our 2003 Shaolin Special (Nov/Dec). Lipeng's father is Zhang Jianshu, who I've known for over a decade. I've had meals at that house shown in Shaolin Ulysses and if you think that's 'the bare minimum', you don't know China at all. Their home was a mansion compared to what most Chinese have in that area. That's where this issue is tough to discuss with people that haven't spent a lot of time with the common folk of China (or India, or Africa, or such nation). The scale is so completely different from what we experience in 1st world countries.

    To add some salt in this wound, Zhang Jianshu's house was completely demolished during the Shaolin relocation. I saw him fleetingly in 2003 (in fact, there's footage of one of his other protege in my video Shaolin Trips: The First World Traditional Wushu Festival). At that point, I think his house was scheduled to be demolished or just recently demolished. I can't remember now. Last I heard, the Zhang family left the area. I haven't seen them since.
    Gene Ching
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  12. #12
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    Man, Gene, wow, is there anybody you don't know? That's crazy.

    So most Chinese are even poorer than them? That's not very good at all.

    Okay, I'm going to shut up now because I know nothing. Will you please just post a lot so we can read?

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    Yep, there it is, Gene Ching as the Shaolin consultant.

    Okay, I don't know what I was thinking. Meimei doesn't look like she's doing taiji there. She says she learned for 3 years, but I have no idea what that form is. It's too stiff for a taiji form.

    Anyway, also you can't tell how big the house is.

    Who knows. They don't look like they're doing that bad -- they even have a yard, something a lot of people in Seattle don't have.

  14. #14
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    Quote Originally Posted by bungbukuen View Post
    Wall – it is completely preposterous to imply that the majority of inhabitants of the Dengfeng municipality are somehow poverty free, or even operating at levels near minimum international poverty line standards. The reality of it is that Dengfeng is also an impoverished region, so I do not know why you try to candy coat this matter. It is insensitive and a real slap in the face to the poor peasant farmers.
    I never said any of that...? Are you sure you are referring to my post? Please go read my post again

    Oh I forgot, aren't you that guy that never reads other people posts and keeps trying to argue, the one from the Huston Shaolin thread a while ago?
    Now I understand ...

    If you are interested just go and re-read my post and you will notice that I did not write any of the things you mention, and that in fact I wrote the opposite, indicating Henan repeatedly as being a very poor region, and that Shaolin business has greatly improved things for many DengFeng residents by Henan standards, keeping in mind that Henan standards are a very low starting point.

    Wall
    Last edited by wall; 09-01-2006 at 07:30 AM.
    > it is your mind, that creates this world >

  15. #15
    Wall – just because you are getting your China facts mixed up there is no need to feel frustrated.

    If you look income levels (urban and rural) between Dengfeng and the rest of the cities in Henan as produced by the Zhengzhou statistical bureau, you will see that Dengfeng is in fact one of the poorest municipalities.

    Average Urban and Rural Montly Net Incomes (RMB)
    Xin Mi: ...............Urban 8758...................Rural 4500
    Xin Zheng:..........Urban 8800...................Rural 4800
    Xin Yang:............Urban 9100....................Rural 4690
    Kong Yi:..............Urban 9045....................Rural 5499
    Dengfeng:..........Urban 7410...................Rural 3990

    I would love to see you try to convince any of the thousands of peasant farmers and families living in the Dengfeng area who have limited access to proper schooling, medical, pension benefits, etc…, that Shaolin temple is having a positive affect on their lives. Poverty and regional income disparities are a severe problem, and it is naïve to assume that corporate revenue dollars somehow majically reduce poverty levels on thier own. What is needed is proper government taxation policies and social infrastructure spending programs.

    Cheers,

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