From the WSJ:
China plans to strip power from the agency that oversees its one-child policy, in a move observers said could mean the eventual phaseout of the much criticized population-control effort. The proposal, put forth on Sunday by a top official during the annual meeting of China's legislature, comes as economists inside and outside the country warn that the policy helps to precipitate a demographic crisis that threatens growth in the world's No. 2 economy as its population rapidly ages... While the family planning agency will exist, merging with the Ministry of Health, leaders have preserved it as a face-saving measure, said Wang
Feng, a population expert and director of the Brookings-Tsinghua Center for Public Policy in Beijing. "The way to interpret this is that the laws are in effect, but the judges and the policemen have all been fired," Mr. Wang said.

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