Will China’s middle-class grow bigger?

By 2022, the upper middle class is estimated to account for 54 percent of urban households and 56 percent of urban private consumption.
Middle-class growth rates are expected to be far greater in the smaller and less developed third and fourth tier cities of the north and the west, where disposable incomes are rising rapidly. In particular, the share of upper-middle-class households in third tier cities is expected to reach more than 30 percent by 2022, up from 15 percent in 2002. Meanwhile, the ratio of China’s urban middle class in the four tier-one cities, Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Shenzhen, is also expected to decrease substantially by 2022. Sustained growth in the size and diversity of China’s middle class will create new market opportunities for both domestic and international companies.