China's economic miracle can be attributed to the effective leverage of its demographic advantage. However, demography is just one of the many factors of economic growth. While China's demographic transition poses a great challenge to its economy, this is a common feature in all demographic economic processes, and cannot be simply blamed on China's population control policies. While quantity used to be the major population and economic problem facing China, at present and in the future the problem is characterized by a more complex nature involving population size, structure and quality impacting on economic development. A large population size does not equal a country success, and has become increasingly decoupled from hard or soft power in the postagricultural era. Considering population growth as a necessary condition for economic growth may blur the focus of population economic relations in the new development stage. Instead of using economic growth as a goal for designing population policies, policymakers should make their only priorities the improvement of the people's social wellbeing and the realization of their potential.