The sixth national census indicates growing gender imbalance in the country. But when some economists at a recent financial forum suggested the number of single women in a city is proportional to its economic advancement, they triggered a heated public debate, says an article on scol.com.cn. Excerpts:

The Ministry of Education listed shengnu, literally "leftover women" (but actually single, especially educated and well-employed, women) as a new word in 2007. Such women set high standards for the men they would marry, and, in the process, many of them end up staying single beyond their traditional marriage age.

But the increase in the number of single women is not a phenomenon unique to China. Apart from Western countries, even other Asian nations are witnessing it. A report in The Economist in 2011 said almost one-third of Japanese women in their early 30s were unmarried and probably half of those will stay that way, and in Singapore, some 27 percent of women aged between 40 and 44 with a college degree were single.

But many still wonder why so many women in Chinese cities cannot find a husband when men outnumber women in China. The truth is that even though Chinese society has become more open-minded, the tradition of a man being superior to his wife in every respect, including earnings, prevails. Hence, many Chinese women don't want to marry a man who earns less than them.

It's time Chinese women changed their outdated mindset, because marriage is sustained by the power of love, even when the traditional husband-and-wife relationship is reversed.

(China Daily 10/24/2012 page9)