Counting gray income: dream on

One of the challenges in trying to figure out how much Chinese actually earn is the gray income. Peking Review has another go at it, but the issue itself seems as old as the tax system is. Because of the fast growing economy, the gray parts has of course also increased in volume.
So, there are basically two ways of looking at it. The conservative approach, where we sadly conclude that for the foreseeable future the absence of a Chinese middle class might not support many of the corporate dream about Chinese consumers. Or the optimistic line where we hope that the gray economy might support those dreams.
Since that cannot be calculated very easy, it is probably the best ways to keep on dreaming.