Shanghai tops China's disposable income list

Shanghai's per capita disposable income topped the country in the first half of this year, reaching 40,357 yuan ($6219.01), according to data released by the National Bureau of Statistics. Beijing and Zhejiang rounded out the top three.

Shanghai is the only Chinese region that saw its per capita disposable income exceed 40,000 yuan, China News Service reported.

Meanwhile, Beijing's figure hit 38,138 yuan, rising 10.3 percent year-on-year in nominal terms. This represented an actual increase of 9.8 percent yearly after deducting price factors, with average growth at 4.4 percent in the last two years.

Eastern China's Zhejiang province ranked third, with per capita disposable income reaching 30,998 yuan.

There were 10 regions outperforming the national average, which stood at 17,642 yuan in H1, up 12.6 percent from the same period last year nominally.

Fang Xiaodan, director of the Household Survey Office of the National Bureau of Statistics, said the increase of people's wages laid a solid foundation for disposable income growth.

During the January-June period, Chinese residents earned 10,104 yuan per capita in wages, up 12.1 percent year-on-year, with an average increase over two years of 7.2 percent.

"As the national economy continues to recover, the employment situation has turned positive, which drives the rapid growth of people's wages," Fang said.

China's consumption also kept rebounding under organized pandemic prevention and control measures. In the first half, per-capita consumer expenditure nationwide hit 11,471 yuan, soaring 18 percent in nominal terms from a year earlier. The figure grew 17.4 percent in real terms after deducting price factors.