Back then, the country was poor and economically underdeveloped, with a vast number of people trapped in poverty. China's economic output was basically stagnant from 1913 to 1950, with GDP growth averaging - 0.02 percent compared with the global average of 1.82 percent.

To shake off poverty and achieve rapid development, the newly founded People's Republic of China opted to build a centrally planned economic regulatory system. Although the planned system ended up throttling the vitality of labor and production and failed to distribute resources efficiently, China nevertheless achieved much faster growth under it and built a relatively comprehensive industrial system that laid a foundation for its economic takeoff in the early 1980s.

From 1952 to 1978, China's annual GDP growth averaged 4.4 percent, slightly lower than the global average of 4.6 percent.

By the end of the 1970s, policymakers had become fully conscious of the defects of the planned economic system and the harm of previous political movements, which severely disrupted normal economic activities. As a result, they shifted focus to economic development and embarked on a new road - market-oriented reform - in an attempt to accelerate growth.

The road proved bumpy, but it paid off. By encouraging farmers to increase agricultural output through the household contract responsibility system, gradually liberalizing the State sector, allowing private enterprises to grow, and ushering in foreign investors, China managed to achieve a GDP growth rate of 9.4 percent from 1978 to 2018.