text: During the Land Reform Movement, China substantially improved income inequality by redistributing land and other property. This was accompanied by social chaos and the consequent mass repression of chaos and killings. The Land Reform targeted eradicating landlords and taking over their land, while increasing the landownership by poor peasants. Still, to improve the overall rural incomes, the party helped protect and preserve the rich peasant economy. According to a rural income survey by China's National Bureau of Statistics, the amount of agricultural capital for different classes generally increased from the Land Reform to 1954. For rich peasants, arable land increased from 25.1 to 31.1 mu per household, and draft animals increased from 114.9 to 184.1 per 100 household.
  Some soviet scholars, including Chaianov, argue that rural stratification is largely based on generations and is thus a demographic question, which is different from the Marxist definition of class.
  Following the implementation of land reforms, Mao instituted a process of collectivization in response to the selling of land by peasants to the new generation of rich landowners. Afraid of creating a new landlord class, Mao instituted a system of communes where land was supposed to be worked equally by peasants. His idea was to capitalize on the sheer number of peasants and effectively produce a surplus harvest that would help industrialization. This was known as the Great Leap Forward, which was a failure and resulted in the deaths of twenty to thirty million peasants.