China's Population is Collapsing

China is closing tens of thousands of kindergartens. Where have all the children gone? Welcome to China Uncensored, I'm Chris Chappell. Be sure to leave a honeypot emoji in the comments below for the algorithm, and in honor of everyone's favorite pooh bear. Check back every Monday, Wednesday, Friday, and Sunday for new episodes. Children are our future. Until the robots take over. But before then, it's the children. They are our seed. Our legacy. The next generation. Without them, there is no society. And China is that unsociety. It's facing a demographic crisis of biblical proportions, complete with flood. People are not having children, while the rest of the country just ages out. You want proof? Look no further than China's schools. China is absolutely hemorrhaging schools for young children. From 2023 to 2024, 28,000 kindergartens and primary schools closed. One year later, China shuttered nearly 30,000 preschools and primary schools, leaving a lot of teachers unemployed, and the schools that survive are barely holding on by a thread. In 2025, one primary school in Shanghai enrolled only 22 children versus 23 teachers on staff, despite being located in one of China's largest cities. With that kind of ratio, most of the teachers can just join the students for nap time. Schools are so desperate that they're forcing the kindergarten teachers who are still working to spend extra hours on marketing. Of all the dystopias I've ever heard of, none are as bleak as teachers forced to promote their school like an open mic comic trying to sell tickets for a bringer show. They're also loosening the criteria for enrollment. For example, while Chinese kindergartens typically enroll children at the age of 3, some kindergarten principals revealed plans to expand the enrollment range to as young as one year old to increase the number of students. Meanwhile, some schools just outright transformed into senior care homes. Ah, they also enjoy naps, applesauce, and pooping their pants close enough. The problem? There's just not enough kids. Regions across the nation have seen year-to-year drops in enrollment as high as 30%. Those are bad numbers, which is the kind of simple math you'd learn in kindergarten if China had any left. Now, some of you seeing this might think, Chris, this isn't just uniquely a Chinese problem. Countries all around the world are facing demographic crises. For example, there's Japan. Its birth rate is dwindling, and its nursery schools keep closing as a result. There have been similar situations in South Korea. And Taiwan. But the numbers don't even begin to compare. 4,000 schools in South Korea total over the course of several years versus 30,000 in China in a single year. Why this is happening isn't a mystery. China's one-child policy has been an absolute disaster for demographics. But here's the thing. Even after the two-child policy came into effect in 2016, the birth rate in China just kept on falling. And none of the things the CCP has tried to do to fix the situation have worked. In 2021, the two-child policy became a three-child policy. Birth rates kept falling. Child subsidies, maternity leave, housing guarantees—all have failed to boost birth rates. Even taxes on condoms didn't work. What it comes down to is this. The Chinese economy is broken, and the Chinese people know it. People are simply choosing not to have babies. Back in 2024, a survey of women of childbearing age in Ningbo revealed that over a third did not want any children. They just can't afford it. Which leads to school closures, which leads to even more unemployment, and a worse economy. No amount of communist social engineering is going to change that. On top of that, China has another problem. AI companions. Thanks to China going all-in on AI, subsidizing AI businesses, and encouraging the world to use their programs, many Chinese people are falling in love with AI companions instead of having real human romance. Which is an excellent way to keep China's excess 30 million males distracted and docile, so they don't, you know. But this isn't exactly great for the demographic crisis. Remember kids, don't date robots. Of course, every country has to deal with the question of AI romance. But this is especially a problem in China. To give you perspective, ByteDance, the parent company of TikTok, created an AI platform called Dobao. And it's so popular that it boasted having close to 350 million monthly active users earlier this year. With companion usership that high, there's bound to be a very large pool of people who are looking to AI for more than just friendship. And certain Chinese companies have made huge profits out of it. One of China's leading AI labs, Minimax, made 35% of its revenue last year from AI companions. But profits, schmoffits, this isn't an economic problem. It's a demographic problem. Well, nothing for it. I guess the CCP is going to have to step in again to crack down on Chinese chatbot love affairs. It's not an outright ban on chatbot companions in general. It's more about forbidding chatbots from encouraging emotional reliance on them. The regulations also ban virtual relationships with minors, and require companies to alert a person's emergency contact if they detect an emotional crisis. Which is just redundant, since living under the CCP is an emotional crisis. Which comes back to the point. The CCP will never be able to legislate its way out of the demographic, economic, and social crisis it created. But it will never stop trying. If the Chinese people want to see their society flourish, one of the best things they could do is stop the CCP from holding onto power. So much of what's going wrong in China can be traced back to communism. Without communism, China's demographic crisis wouldn't be nearly as bad as it is today. Which is why I need you. If you want to join me in deleting communism, join my 50-Cent Army by signing up to my website, ChinaUncensored.tv. When you subscribe, you'll get access to a vibrant chat community, exclusive livestreams, and special deep dive episodes made just for my 50-Cent Army. Just click this button here or the link below. Once again, I'm Chris Chappell. Thanks for watching.