Last Train Home Essay

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In the post-Mao period, China has experienced an economic miracle, growing from an underdeveloped, mainly agrarian country into an industrial world power. Though this growth is remarkable, it has left many Chinese citizens behind. The Zhang family, depicted in the film Last Train Home, are among this group; the migrant worker parents struggle to provide for the family, failing to reap benefits from the economic boom. Thus, the family demonstrates the failure of modern China to follow through on the Maoist utopian vision of an empowered agrarian class. In fact, China has directly repudiated Maoist socialist thought since Mao’s death, developing into an unfettered capitalism. Throughout the 1990s, government officials failed to differentiate between beneficial and harmful elements of the socialist system, …show more content…

The capitalist economy created both winners and losers. Income disparities “widened both substantially and rapidly…primarily to the detriment of the rural population.” Due to this massive unemployment, workers were forced to take whatever job they could find, no matter the conditions. Equipped with a massive labor pool and unregulated individual contracting, private enterprises dictated the terms of employment. Companies forced employees to endure awful contract terms, giving them enough vacation time to visit home just once a year. Last Train Home personalizes this plight, revealing the extreme sacrifice of workers who shoulder the burden of China’s economic success. Aboard a train heading to the countryside, the film crew interviews multiple migrant workers. One man, traveling to see his three-month-old son for the first time, worries if he will make it home in time. “If the family can’t even celebrate the New Year together,” he says, “life would be pointless.” Despite this, he continues on. “That’s life” says the worker “it’s all for our

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