This paper examines how the experience of childhood has changed in China against the backdrop of the wider political, social and economic transformations in the 20th century. Drawing on multi-generational life history interviews in China, I explore the nature, origins and impact of continuities and changes in childhood experiences across three generations. It disputes the Eurocentric modernization of childhood narrative, which predicts a shift from a family’s economic valuation of a child to a primary emphasis on the child’s needs. In China the persistence of moral ideals underlying filial piety, lent added force by economic and welfare uncertainties, highlights the continuing economic value placed on adult children by parents who see them as essential adjuncts in the provision of old age support. Rather than being trapped in a linear progression model, the Chinese case exposes a complex, seemingly contradictory and sometimes paradoxical mix of continuity and change. As the economic value of children as family helpers has dramatically diminished across three generations, the new emphasis on the increasing emotional value of children has been tempered by recognition of their continuing economic role as a source of support in old age.