Analysis-Painful policy choices loom after China's 'monumental' consumer stimulus plan

China's stimulus plans to fill consumer pockets to meet its 2024 growth target breaks away from a decades-old policy playbook, but making household demand a sustainable driver of development instead of investment is a long path paved with tough choices. Reuters reported last week that Beijing plans to issue sovereign bonds worth about 2 trillion yuan ($284 billion) this year, in part to subsidise consumer goods purchases and child support, effectively transferring funds to households. That marks a shift towards stimulating consumption that many economists have called on Beijing to pursue for more than a decade, warning that China may otherwise grind towards a prolonged period of low growth as seen in Japan in the 1990s.