China is a nation of savers. The Chinese government wants its people to spend more and save less. It also wants them to take on more debt, all for the sake of saving the economy from a four-year slump.

中国是一个储蓄大国。中国政府希望民众多消费、少储蓄。为了将经济从持续四年的低迷中拯救出来，政府还希望民众承担更多债务。

The national financial regulator urged banks in March to expand consumer lending and offer more flexible repayment terms. Last month, policymakers promised to provide “innovative” financial services to boost consumption.

今年3月，国家金融监管机构敦促银行扩大消费信贷，并提供更灵活的还款条件。上个月，政策制定者承诺提供“创新”金融服务以提振消费。

Yet many Chinese consumers are wary. An alarming number of them are already defaulting on their debt.

然而，许多中国消费者依然心存顾虑。令人担忧的是，他们当中已经有相当一部分人开始出现债务违约。

From 2021 to 2024, China’s total household savings grew 50 percent, as people scared off by a big decline in housing values stuffed their money in banks. During the same period, the number of loans that households could not afford to pay back nearly doubled.

从2021年到2024年，由于人们对房价大幅下跌感到担忧害怕，纷纷将钱存入银行，中国居民储蓄总额增长了50%。同期，家庭无力偿还的贷款数量几乎翻了一番。

For Beijing, expanding access to credit may seem like a quick way to stimulate the economy. But this push for consumers to borrow risks deepening a growing personal debt crisis. Many borrowers, particularly young people, are caught in cycles of debt, driven by poor financial literacy, high youth unemployment and stagnant wages.

对北京而言，扩大对信贷的获取似乎是刺激经济的快捷方式。但这种鼓励消费者借贷的做法有可能加深日益严重的个人债务危机。许多借款人，尤其是年轻人，因金融知识匮乏、青年失业率高企以及工资停滞不前而陷入了债务循环。

Those caught in the cycle run the gamut: factory workers, young professionals and gig economy workers. They are people who barely make ends meet while living in fear of default, calls from debt collectors and an overwhelming sense of shame.

陷入这种循环的人形形色色，有工厂工人，有年轻职场人士，还有零工经济从业者。他们只能勉强维持生计，生活在对违约的恐惧、讨债电话和巨大的羞耻感中。

One person I interviewed, a 27-year-old tech worker in Shanghai, said he often borrowed from one online consumer finance app to repay what he owed to another one. He said the anxiety was overwhelming. “I feel trapped in an endless loop,” he said, asking me to use only his surname, Xia. The other three people I interviewed also asked not to be identified for fear of government retribution.

我采访的一位27岁的上海科技行业从业者表示，他经常从一个在线消费金融应用程序借钱来偿还欠另一个应用程序的资金。他说焦虑感令人窒息。“陷入了一个网贷是越积累越多的循环，”他说。他要求我只使用他的姓——夏。由于担心政府的报复，我采访的另外三人也要求匿名。

There is a growing split in China’s economy. The better-offs are saving more for rainy days. The worse-offs have little choice but to take on debt.

中国经济出现日益扩大的分化。条件较好的人为不时之需储蓄更多。条件较差的人别无选择，只能背负债务。

北京大学的学生，摄于5月。许多借款人，尤其是年轻人，陷入了债务循环。

A recent quarterly survey by China’s central bank with 20,000 respondents across 50 cities showed that consumers were increasingly pessimistic. Their perception of job security has fallen to record lows. Their willingness to spend has dropped to levels unseen since the height of the Covid-19 pandemic.

中国人民银行最近一个季度对全国50个城市的2万名受访者进行的调查显示，消费者变得越来越悲观。他们对就业保障的看法已跌至历史最低点。他们的消费意愿也降至新冠疫情高峰以来的最低水平。

Last year, an estimated 25 million to 34 million people defaulted on personal loans, twice the number in 2019, according to Gavekal Dragnomics, a research consultancy. Include loans that were overdue, but not yet in default, and the number of risky borrowers swells to between 61 million and 83 million. That amounts to between 5 percent and 7 percent of the total population 15 and older.

研究咨询公司龙洲经讯的数据显示，去年估计有2500万至3400万人拖欠个人贷款，是2019年的两倍。如果算上逾期但尚未违约的贷款，风险借款人的数量则膨胀至6100万至8300万。这相当于15岁及以上总人口的5%至7%。

As in the United States, defaults wreck personal credit records in China, locking people out of future borrowing and significantly limiting their upward mobility. But the punitive effect could be aggravated because China lacks a formal bankruptcy system to allow individuals to erase their debts.

与美国一样，违约在中国会破坏个人信用记录，使人们无法在未来借款，并严重限制他们的向上流动空间。但由于中国缺乏正式的破产制度来允许个人清除债务，导致后果愈发严重。

For many indebted individuals, taking on more loans is a means of survival, not consumption.

对于许多负债累累的个体来说，借更多贷款是为了生存，而非消费。

Mr. Xia, the tech professional in Shanghai, said he had begun borrowing small sums through Alipay’s Huabei payments service during college to cover basic expenses. After graduating in 2019, his debt ballooned, peaking at over $7,000, an amount that would be manageable if he had stable employment. But he said he had been unemployed half the time since graduation.

上海的科技从业者夏先生表示，他在大学期间就开始通过支付宝的花呗服务借小额款项来支付基本开销。2019年毕业后，他的债务激增，最高时超过了5万元——如果他有稳定的工作，这个金额本可以应付。但他说，毕业以来有一半时间都处于失业状态。

It’s easy to get consumer loans online in China, probably more so than it is in other countries, said Victor Shih, an economist at the University of California, San Diego.

加州大学圣地亚哥分校的经济学家史宗瀚表示：“在中国，从网络上获得消费贷款很容易，可能比其他许多国家都容易。”

China’s biggest internet platforms, with huge user bases, all have loan portals. They work with state-owned banks, which are eager to lend to consumers since the housing crash ate into their business. Online loans’ interest rates are usually higher than credit cards, and online payments are much more widely used than credit cards in China.

中国最大的互联网平台拥有庞大的用户基础，它们都设有贷款平台。这些平台与国有银行合作，由于房地产崩盘冲击了银行业务，国有银行急于向消费者放贷。在线贷款的利率通常高于信用卡，而在中国，在线支付的使用范围也远广于信用卡。

The loan offers are everywhere on the internet. When ordering a takeout meal on a delivery app, users are asked if they want to borrow money to pay for the meal.

互联网上的贷款邀约无处不在。在外卖应用上下单时，用户会被询问是否需要贷款支付餐费。

Obtaining a loan, Mr. Xia said, often requires providing only basic identity and employment information, and the money is disbursed nearly instantly.

夏先生表示，获取贷款通常只需提供基本的身份和就业信息，资金几乎能即时到账。

中国广州的一家服装作坊。中国各地的债务负担问题普遍存在，从工厂工人到年轻职场人士，各行各业均受其影响。

Despite being in debt since 2018, Mr. Xia said he had little knowledge about how interest or credit scores worked. None of the four borrowers I interviewed could tell me the interest rates or service charges on their loans.

尽管从2018年起就负债，夏先生却对利息或信用评分的运作机制知之甚少。我采访的四位借款人中，没有一个能说出自己贷款的利率或服务费。

But they all said they had anxiety, depression or insomnia. One of them, a 26-year-old meal deliveryman in Chongqing, emailed me at 4 a.m. because he was too stressed to sleep.

但他们都表示自己存在焦虑、抑郁或失眠问题。其中一位是重庆的26岁外卖员，他在凌晨4点给我发邮件，说自己压力大得睡不着。

Another man, burdened with $220,000 in debt after several business failures and long stretches of unemployment, told me that he had considered jumping off a building. He and his wife, both in their mid-30s, have had nearly no income for the past two years and no luck finding jobs since they have been told they were too old.

另一位男子因几次创业失败和长期失业背负了约160万元的债务，他说自己曾想过跳楼。他和妻子都30多岁，过去两年几乎没有收入，找工作也屡屡碰壁，只因被认为年纪太大。

The man, whose surname is Shao, said he missed a loan payment on June 10. At 9 a.m. the next day, collectors were calling incessantly.

这位只透露自己姓邵的男子说，他于6月10日错过了贷款还款期。第二天上午9点，催收人员就开始不停地打电话。

“The calls are designed to intimidate and insult,” he said. “They want to pressure you into finding a way to repay, whether it’s taking on other loans or borrowing from friends and families.”

“就是恐吓你、侮辱你，”他说，他们的核心目的就是搞你的心态，就是让你承受不住压力，然后自己去想办法，无论去别的平台借也好，去找亲戚朋友借也好，得让我把这个钱还上。”

He had prepared himself by reading about the experiences of others like him on online forums and speaking to friends who work at debt collection companies. Still, the pressure was unbearable.

他事先在网上论坛了解了其他类似遭遇者的经历，也和在催收公司工作的朋友聊过，有了些心理准备。但即便如此，压力还是难以承受。

Mr. Shao has yet to experience what many consider the worst part: the public shaming. Collectors will start calling family and friends from a borrower’s phone contact list, a tactic banned in principle but still widely used.

邵先生还没经历过许多人认为最糟糕的事：公开羞辱。催收人员会开始拨打借款人手机通讯录里的家人和朋友电话，这种策略原则上是被禁止的，但仍被广泛使用。

Many borrowers feel that shame long before they default on a debt. The societal values are shifting, but older Chinese people who have lived through hard times tend to judge the young harshly.

许多借款人在债务违约前很久就已感受到这种羞耻。社会价值观在发生转变，但经历过艰难岁月的中国老一辈人，往往对年轻人严厉评判。

After listening to my Chinese podcast episode on this topic, a businesswoman sent me a long text message: “Where have our Chinese virtues gone — diligence, frugality, and living within our means?”

一位女企业家听完我关于这个话题的中文播客后，给我发了一条长消息，其中说：“我们中国人勤俭节约的美德到哪儿去了？”

中国良渚的一家咖啡馆。据龙洲经讯的估计，去年中国约有2500万至3400万人出现个人贷款逾期，是2019年的两倍。

But others pushed back on blaming the debtors, arguing that the problem is China’s credit system.

但也有人反对将责任归咎于借款人，认为问题出在中国的信用体系。

“The lending mechanism is a honey trap,” one podcast listener commented, “designed precisely to catch ordinary people at their weakest moments.”

“放贷机制就是个甜蜜陷阱，”一位播客听众评论道，“专门设计用来在普通人最脆弱的时候套住他们。”

Another comment, using a Chinese idiom, likened Beijing’s consumer loan push to “drinking poison to quench thirst,” arguing that it does nothing to tackle the underlying causes of weak consumption — economic hardship and an inadequate social safety net — and merely delays the inevitable by encouraging borrowing against the future.

另一条评论用了一个中国成语，将政府推动消费贷款比作“饮鸩止渴”，认为这无法解决消费疲软的根本原因——经济困境和社会保障体系不完善——只是通过鼓励透支未来来拖延不可避免的问题。

Policymakers have floated proposals like a “credit repair” program to help people who default reclaim access to loans, but analysts say they could take time to establish. Authorities also limit debt collectors to no more than three calls a day per person and prohibit calls during off hours. Still, complaints against debt collectors are soaring, suggesting that enforcement is weak.

政策制定者已提出诸如“信用修复”计划等提案，帮助违约者重新获得贷款资格，但分析人士称，这些计划可能需要时间才能建立。当局还规定，债务催收机构每天对每位债务人最多只能拨打三次电话，并禁止在非工作时间打电话。然而，针对催收人员的投诉仍在激增，这表明执行力度薄弱。

And without a personal bankruptcy system in China, there are few ways to discharge debt. Defaulting on a loan can leave a permanent mark.

而且，中国没有个人破产制度，几乎没有债务免除的途径。贷款违约可能会留下永久的污点。

The feeling of desperation over consumer debt is widespread.

因消费债务产生的绝望感普遍存在。

On the video site Bilibili, an account called Quitting Society functions like an online support meeting room for debtors. During livestreaming sessions, the 30-year-old host reads out confessions from people who say they’re addicted to online borrowing. His most important advice: Tell your parents, and seek help immediately.

在视频网站哔哩哔哩上，一个名为“戒社”的账号就像债务人的线上互助会。直播时，这位30岁的主播会朗读那些自称沉迷网络借贷者的忏悔。他最重要的建议是：告诉父母，立即寻求帮助。

The account has over one million followers. A hashtag urging all online borrowers to watch the videos has drawn 170 million views and more than 70,000 comments on the social media site Weibo.

该账号有超过100万粉丝。在社交媒体平台微博上，一个呼吁所有网络借贷者观看这些视频的话题标签已获得1.7亿次浏览，有超过7万条评论。