One Country, Two Systems

China's President Xi Jinping paid a visit to Hong Kong on Thursday to mark the 20th anniversary of the return of the former British Crown Colony to the People's Republic of China on July 1, 1997. Since that day, Hong Kong is a special administrative region of China, following a distinctively liberal economic model due to its history within the British Empire. “One country, two systems” is the political doctrine under which China permitted the former colony to maintain its political and economic independence within the People's Republic for 50 years after the handover in 1997.

We at Statista, took this event as an opportunity to have a look at the GDP per capita as an economic performance indicator to compare China and Hong Kong: Accordingly, Hong Kong has a much higher GDP per capita which increased from 22,758 in 1997 to 36,173 U.S. dollars in 2015 while China’s GDP grew steadily from 1,444 to 6,498 U.S. dollars.

According to the World Bank’s Ease of Doing Business Index, China ranked 78th in 2016, while Hong Kong as a major financial hub and top spot for entrepreneurs stood in fourth place.