Illustration: Lu Ting/GT
"Moonlight clan" is a relatively new Chinese neologism to describe young workers who spend their salaries faster than they earn it. Opposite of the Western definition of the word "moonlighting," which means to take on more than one job to earn more money, in China a "moonlighter" works as little as possible but spends at least two salaries worth of money per paycheck.
However, one 24-year-old female software developer in Chongqing has made headlines recently for breaking ranks with her spendthrift post-1990s generation counterparts and saving over 120,000 yuan ($18,015) since graduating university two years ago.
Li Xueqin works six days a week but earns only 6,000 yuan per month. As such, she still lives with her parents, does not buy cosmetics or branded apparel and rarely goes out socially.
Her parents offered to buy her a car, but she refused, preferring instead to take public transportation. Rather than joining a gym, the latest fad in China, she bought herself a jump rope to stay fit. She cooks all her own meals at home.
After posting her frugal lifestyle on social media, the Interwebs became heated with numerous debates about Li's method of saving money.
Some praised her for being resourceful and not wasting all her salary on meaningless purchases. However, many more netizens are criticizing Li for being financially co-dependent on her parents, without whom it would be unlikely that Li could live in Chongqing without spending at least one-third of her salary on an apartment and utilities.
But the biggest insults are coming from those who believe that economic independence should be the biggest goal for China's youngest generations of adults.
Post-1990s Chinese are notorious for being "boomerangs" who, after college, quickly return to their parents nest where they can live in comfort while spending their salaries on material possessions and social activities.
According to a 2014 study conducted by Peking University, over one-third of recent Chinese graduates choose to live with their parents. A large percentage of them either fail to or choose not to actively seek out employment, and the ones who do work don't save, instead spending on fashionable clothes or the newest smartphones.
Part of this trend can be attributed to the fact that, due to the rapidly rising number of university-educated Chinese, the local job market is unable to keep up with demand.
There ARE jobs, especially in the labor and vocational sectors, but young, educated Chinese who have become spoiled from the easy life of the nation's burgeoning economy prefer not to stoop to that level of employment.
Frankly, there's no way in hell an engineer or IT major is going to do construction or wait tables at a restaurant. They would rather stay unemployed and just live at home.
"With strong consumption confidence and a liking for pleasure seeking, young professionals are more likely to move quickly from necessities to luxuries," Wu Qiong, a Beijing-based analyst, predicted in a 2005 article in the Shanghai Star newspaper, back when the term "moonlight clan" first started appearing.
Over 10 years later, Wu's forecast has come profoundly true. Today, China's domestic consumption has become the driving force behind its economic growth.
Consumption contributed 66 percent of the GDP in 2015, up 15 percent from 2014, according to data from China's National Bureau of Statistics.
Retail sales grew over 10 percent year-on-year in 2015, fueled largely by the rising preference among "moonlighters" for online shopping, reaching 3.88 trillion yuan last year.
Surely, if Li Xueqin becomes a role model among new grads, China's economy will soon start to stumble. Living frugally is exactly what retailers and economists don't want young Chinese adults to do, hence the vocal outcry on social media after Li's budget went viral.
But really, Li is not much of a role model anyway. Not because she chooses not to waste her money on materialism, but simply because her niggardly behavior is holding her back from truly living life and having all the interesting experiences that come from being independent.
Post-1990s Chinese need to find a balance between the wasteful consumption of moonlighters and Li's frugality. That will keep them and the economy happy - a win-win for society and our country.
