[We recently asked our friend Mario Cavolo, a frequent contributor to the Rick’s Picks forum, what it’s like from a cost-of-living standpoint to live in Shanghai. A New York City expatriate who lives and works in Shanghai himself as an entrepreneur, author, TV and radio personality, he graciously obliged with the guest commentary below. The fictitious diary is that of a middle-manager, Mr. Wang, who, like many of us in the U.S., struggles to make ends meet. RA]

In this piece, we shall spend an imaginary and obviously unrealistic day in the life of a typical middle-class man living an ordinary life in Shanghai.  In the process, we shall come to better understand the typical costs associated with middle-class family life in today’s China.   Our “average Joe” is Mr. Wang, 30 years old, a white collar worker who might be an engineer, architect, human resources administrator or account manager. He is a middle-class professional who works for a large Chinese or multinational company, earning a salary of perhaps 4000-8000 renminbi ($670-$1340) per month plus a nice benefit package, and living “in the city” with his wife and brother. Note as well that if the Wang family lived in a secondary city such as Chengdu, Shenyang, Changchun and dozens of others, the local costs and prices noted would range 20% to 40% lower. For example, a taxi in Shanghai starts at 14rmb/$2.20, while in Shenyang they start at 8rmb/$1.40. Similar local apartment rents in a second-tier city are quite low, at 1500-2500rmb ($275-$450)/month for a 2-3 bedroom unit.

Mr. Wang’s Rough Morning

Sunrise greets our day once again, leading us out the door at 8 am. from Wang’s 900 square-foot, three-bedroom, fourth-floor walk-up which rents for 3000rmb/$500 per month. Mind you, that is pretty cheap, but only because Mr. Wang does not live in prime downtown Shanghai where rent for the same type of older apartment would be 5000rmb/$800. Note that I did say “three” bedrooms, as Mr. Wang’s brother lives in the third. This type of sharing is the rule, not the exception, in China, leading me to tell you that I estimate the average per person rent range in local China to be 625-1350rmb/$100-$200 per month depending on which end of the salary range one can afford.  It is a

briskly paced ten-minute walk to the subway or public bus which awaits at a cost of 5rmb/$.50 for a 30-40 minute transit to work; Wang makes a five-minute breakfast pit stop along the way at one of many street vendors selling 2rmb/$.25 veggie/meat filled steam buns or  a Chinese-style fast-grilled pancake with an egg in it, along with a container of milk or soy milk at 1.5rmb/$.20.  He checks his watch on arrival and exclaims, “Wa! I’m running late!”, so instead of walking, he hops on the back of one of the many motorcycle or tricycle carts (illegal) for 5rmb/$.50 to arrive at work in five minutes instead of the usual fifteen. Scenario 2: Wang lives it up a bit and hops a taxi  to work every morning for 30rmb/$5. Scenario 3: Wang is fortunate to work for one of the many regional or national-sized companies who offer shuttle bus pickup/drop-off every hour from 8am to 10pm – cost: zero.  That’s a helluva benefit, as a result of which Mr. Wang’s main means of transportation in his personal life is an old, rusty bicycle which he won’t replace with a new one because a new one is more likely to be stolen.

A Toothache Strikes!

Nine a.m., and agony strikes!  “Arghh! My toothache has returned,” exclaims Wang to his boss — and off he goes for a root canal at a local, clean, decent dental clinic. Cost: $85 for the typical three-visit root canal. On the way back to the office, Wang decides to stop at the local Circle K-type market where it is convenient to pay his utility bills and charge up his mobile phone ($10 to $20/month). Average electric/gas/water for the month is close to 180rmb/$30 or 1000rmb/$120, depending. Say what? Well, yes, “depending.” You see, if Wang is a typically thrifty local Chinese living south of the mighty Yangtze River, he wears lots of thick clothes in the winter, when temperatures average 4-10C/35-40 degrees, with perhaps a couple of weeks at or below zero, and he does not turn on the heat, not ever. In fact, even the student dormitories at Shanghai’s best universities are not heated in the wintertime, only the dorm bath/shower areas. And no, as you are surely about to ask, the students are not allowed to bring in little electric space heaters to get toasty. Ditto for summertime heat, many Chinese will relieve the humid 90-degree temperatures with no more than the breeze of electric and handheld fans.

Ten a.m., and more agony! Wang’s brother had gone out the door at the same time this morning to do the day’s shopping at the local farmer’s market. He spent 3rmb/$.50 / lb. for a typical assortment of veggies such as lettuces, peppers, potatoes, leeks, onions, etc., 9rmb/$1.50 per lb. for a variety of fresh clams, 20rmb/$3 for 2lbs of fresh, frozen perch, 35rmb/$5.75 for a live freshly killed 2lb catfish, double that price for a cut of the day’s salmon carcass. Hankering for meat, he sauntered over to the butcher’s area and picked up some pork loin with a thick strip of fat still on its edge at 18rmb/$3 per lb. and raw chicken for 12rmb/$2 per lb. Chicken breasts, incidentally, are equally cheap, not regarded as a higher quality meat cut as in the West compared to legs and thighs because the breast meat is regarded as tougher and dryer.

Grocery Mishap

Moving back to the agony in the story; on the way back home from the market Mr. Wang’s brother slipped in a puddle of water along the curb and, wow, you should have seen the groceries go flying! Sad to see all that food hit the ground, some of which was saved. But more to the point, Wang’s brother’s lower back also hit the ground with a thud, and so off to the hospital he went.

Eleven a.m.: Arrive Dong Fang #1 hospital on the Pudong side of Shanghai’s Huang Pu River. If you happened to need to park your car, 10rmb/$1.50  (#1 level hospitals are the larger, main city hospitals, rather than smaller local #2 and #3 hospital clinics which also exist in China’s healthcare system. They offer many services which smaller hospitals do not, as they lack the diagnostic equipment.) Patient registration window: 20rmb/$3.50. Nurse: “What’s the problem?” Wang’s brother, “I fell, lower back/hip injury.” Nurse: “3rd floor, room 15C, go wait there until they call your name.” Now, mind you, this is similar to a doctor’s visit in the west where you wait in the waiting room until they call you or your number lights up on an LED board to tell you it’s your turn. Except that you did not need to make an appointment in the first place. Furthermore, if Wang’s brother’s injury was more of an emergency that could not wait, he would have gone directly to the emergency department, where he would presumably be seen sooner, but at essentially the same cost.

11:30 a.m. Sorry, pal. W-a-a-a-y too many people at the hospital today, so you’ll be seeing the doctor after lunch. A truly local Chinese lunch typically consists of some meat, fish or tofu with veggies over rice and costs the average local 8-15rmb/$1.25-$2.50.  For those Chinese citizens guilty of creating the new generation of unhealthy fat kids, a McDonald’s or KFC happy meal with fries and a Pepsi goes for 15-25rmb/$2.5-$4. Those on tight budgets will eat 2-3 stuffed steam buns at 2rmb/$0.20 each. Ah, the fruit, can’t forget the fresh fruit! 1rmb/$.15 for that “apple a day…”

Afternoon Shopping Spree

2:30 p.m.: Wang’s brother is pretty sore, so the doctor orders an X-ray, writes it up, hands the slip to Wang’s brother who goes to pay at the cashier’s window on the second floor. Cost: 45rmb/$7.50.  He waits for the X-ray department to hand him the X-ray envelope so he can take it upstairs to the doctor.  Note on payment for services: Whatever the doctor at the hospital orders, whether a test or blood work, or an X-ray, you pay for it first or you don’t get it.  Also, if you have medical benefits as part of your employment package, typically you are given a plastic company debit card on which is a credit of a few hundred rmb for you to use when you need to see a doctor or buy medicine.

Boy, oh boy! It seems Wang’s brother really whacked his lower back, so the doctor orders a CT-scan. Cost: 300rmb/$45. The scan is somehow still not able to satisfy this meticulous doctor, so he orders an MRI! Good grief! Mortgage the house! Sell the dog! Just kidding, folks. Cost: around 800rmb/$130. That’s without insurance, and not kidding.  (I’ve had two of them myself.) Finally, we hear from the doctor: “Wang’s brother is okay. He will survive!” the physician declares. But his convalescence will require plenty of ibuprofen — not so cheap at 17rmb/$3 for a box of twenty; 12-hour 300mg capsules, and ice over the next two weeks. There was a break of the skin that wasn’t too deep, but just to be safe the doctor gives Wang’s brother a prescription for some Ciprofloxacin, um, oh shoot, or was that Cephalexin? Darn, I can’t remember, but I do remember the week’s cost of those handy-dandy antibiotics at a dirt cheap 15rmb/$2.50! Now, this next part is really embarrassing and a bit of a side story. I heard through the grapevine that Wang’s sister’s cousin’s best friend, Miss Ding, is really fuming these days because she dated Mark’s other friend for a couple of months and now finds herself with a case of herpes! Ho-ho. Gossipy stuff indeed, but I mention it only because a typical ten-day course of acyclovir probably sets the poor guy back a scant 50rmb/$8.75.

Harvard-Trained MD

Did I mention that Wang’s brother was chatting with the doctor during the exam? In fact, the doctor spoke decent English and enjoyed practicing with Wang’s brother, who wasn’t half bad at English himself. Wang’s brother: “Ah, you have been to the U.S., really? Where?” asked Wang. Doctor: “Massachusetts! I studied at Harvard Medical School,” said the doctor.. Not bad for a $3.50 hospital registration fee to see the doc.

3:30 p.m. Meanwhile, Wang’s brother’s friend Li was kind enough to come to the hospital so Wang could get back to work. Li drives a decent car and stops at the gas station for 20 liters of 93 octane regular at 8.5rmb/liter, which I believe is around $5/gallon.  This friend of the Wang family is also a smoker, and, as the story reveals, quite the compulsive shopper too! He picks up a fresh pack of famous Double Happiness brand cheap cigarettes at 5rmb/$.90 while there are a variety of other brands running from three to ten times higher in price depending on whom you might be trying to impress.  Thirst suddenly comes, so the cold section door swings open as a hand grabs plastic pints of Coke, green tea, and spring water, all priced around 3rmb/$.35.  Ooh, man! Mid-day low-sugar hunger pangs hit, and so it’s time for a quick-food snack like fast-food Japanese rice rolls stuffed with veggie, tofu and that fake-crab stuff. Cost: another 6rmb/$1.  As you will have surmised by mow, the average Chinese diet isn’t much healthier than an average American diet, with too many carbs and fats. And yet, people here are slimmer, perhaps because walking and biking are much more common.

Happy-Hour Libations

Of course, Wang’s brother’s friend would never drink alcohol before driving because the law in China is now zero tolerance for alcohol in your blood while driving, and a violation earns one a guaranteed 15 days in detention plus a one-year driver’s license suspension.  So with that sobering thought in mind, he picks up a few for his arrival home; a pint of Budweiser, Japanese brands Asahi and Kirin (all at 4% alcohol) at 8rmb/$1.40 per pint, while the local famous brews like Tsingdao and Snow (at 2-3% alcohol) go for half that price at only 4rmb/$.70 per pint-sized bottle. To liven things up a bit and keep warm in the winter without heat, cheap, 80-100 proof rice liquor rocket fuel called baijiu is also available for less than a buck.

For those who drink alcohol, we must pause to note that here’s where the alcohol thing gets crazy: in the world of wine. You see, Wang’s brother’s friend Mark is a foreigner from France. He’s coming for dinner tonight and we don’t need to speculate on whether he prefers wine with dinner.  Nothing fancy, even a decent Chilean merlot will do, Mark had reminded his host of this a couple of days earlier. Back in the USA, as you know, it’s off to Trader Joe’s, where you’ll find a  lovely variety of drinkable wines from $5 to $12/bottle. And in fact, you’ll find the same variety and selection of the world’s most popular wines in Chinese supermarkets, too: Chilean, Australian, French, South African, California and, hey, you can bet the Italian Pinto Grigios and Chiantis are right there too. Glorious days, oh thee nouveau Chinese wine consumer! Explosive growth in the wine market has arrived in China – indeed, right along with explosive consumption growth of most goods, imported or otherwise.  Except that a bottle of the cheapest drinkables here will set you back around triple; at least 80-120rmb/$13-$20 and most of the nicer, middle-of-the-road $15-$30 bottles back in the U.S. or Europe will set you back a cool 250-500rmb/$40-$90! Of course when you’re in the mood to indulge and impress once a week as Wang’s brother’s friend is obliged to do for his house guests,  there’s nothing like a bag of Doritos, which will set you back a cool 60rmb/$9.50 to go with that $30 bottle of rot-gut French table merlot.

From Grapes to Italian Tomatoes

Grapes and tomatoes are said to be very healthy, both packed with all those micronutrients such as like lycopenes that I won’t bother to mention here. I bring it up because, while consumer goods imported from most other countries like the U.S., Australia, or other European countries are typically double or triple the cost, Italian imported goods are not. As a typical Italian-American growing up in New York, canned Italian plum tomatoes were a staple, along with garlic and olive oil. Here in China, those imported cans of Italian tomatoes, along with Italian pastas and a few other Italian imported products (except all olive oils, which are also expensive), are priced no higher than back in the States. A can of Italian plum tomatoes here sets Wang back 12rmb/$2, a bargain for those times when his foreign friends come for dinner, giving Wang and his lovely wife a chance to try their hand at cooking Western foods for a change.

It’s a Boy!

9:00pm – Aya! (the Chinese version of Wow! or Gee!):  Wang’s wife’s water broke after dinner! Off to the Pudong #1 Maternity Hospital they go for an uncomplicated, natural childbirth, three nights of rest and another happy family joins China’s current boom- boom baby boom that no one besides me seems to be noticing and writing about. More to the point for today, let’s talk about the pregnancy and birth bill.  Mrs. Wang is a tiny thing, and so her baby in vitro was healthy but at 32 weeks still a bit “on the small side.” And so the doctor recommends that Mrs. Wang do what I call the “Chinese pregnant mother cheap country club hospital holiday.”  This means sharing a room with three to five other expecting mothers, there to relax, eat well, receive extra protein amino-acids and vitamins by IV, and receive one round (one round regarded as quite safe) of dexamethasone to insure the healthy development of the wee one’s lungs. As to the cost of this rather common event in the world of Chinese families: seven days in the hospital, shared room, at an average of 700rmb/$110 per day, totaling 5000rmb/$980.  Wow, a decent medical-themed holiday! Now add in half- a-dozen routine hospital follow-up visits with ultrasounds and blood tests during the term of the pregnancy, at an average 300rmb/$75 per visit. Finally, the bill for the labor/birth experience typically comes in at China’s largest, most popular maternity wards around 6000rmb/$1,000. However Pudong’s #1 Maternity is regarded as a step-up in quality, so the final bill is higher at 11,000rmb/$1,600. Again, all of my costs noted are without any type of health care coverage.

Drugs, Gambling and…Baby Formula

Considering the baby boom currently under way here, it is fitting that our look at middle class costs ends at the beginning — the beginning of family life that is. A month’s worth of comfy diapers dings the daily budget for around 9rmb/$1.50 per day, totaling 270rmb/$45 per month — not much cheaper than in the states, I suspect. (Six to eight diapers per day, right, Dads?)  China’s baby car-seats – which, by the way, are still not required by law, can be purchased for around 300rmb/$50 and you’ll need 250-500rmb/$40-$80 for a decent China-brand stroller.

No story such as this can touch well upon the concerns and needs of today’s China families without exploring the hottest product around — one for which Chinese people cross the border by the thousands into the gambling mecca of Macau each and every day. Drugs? No. You mean, gambling? Nope. You must mean the prostitutes then?! Wrong again. Its baby formula, a food product in a country with a dismal record of food manufacturing safety, a topic laced with legitimate worry, a product hopefully not laced with melamine ever again. Reputable Chinese brand baby formula will set back the Wang family budget by about 625rmb/$100 per month. You should know that this is an item where many families will if at all possible buy the more trusted, better brands and even imported brands of baby formula, raising the wallet-shrinking number well over 1000rmb/$150 per month.

Last time I checked, in every country and culture around the globe, momma’s breast milk was still absolutely free. Thankfully, there are some sacred things in this world that the shenanigans of today’s shameful politicians, greedy banking elite, and even China’s highly inflationary economy simply can’t touch.

***

The exclusive Kindle version of Mario Cavolo’s new book, China: Inside Out & Upside Down, Volume I, will be published in the coming weeks.