World-China Forum

China's urban employment

China had seen some recovery signs in employment, as 3.65 million urbanites had found new jobs during the first four months this year, an executive meeting of the State Council presided over by Premier Wen Jiabao said here Wednesday.

China's urban unemployment rate was 4.2 percent at the end of 2008.There were 8.86 million urban residents registered as jobless. The government plans to allocate 42 billion yuan (about 6.13 billion U.S. dollars) in boosting employment from the central budget in 2009, up 66.7 percent from last year, said a statement from the meeting.

However, participants to the meeting pointed out that China still faced a grim employment situation with oversupply and structural problems, as China's economy was not recovering on a solid footing. They called for better implementations for the supportive policies and further efforts on creating more job opportunities, especially those for college graduates. The government would also encourage the development of small- and mid-sized enterprises and those of the service sector, which will provide more jobs than big enterprises, they said. (Xinhua)

China's national college entrance exam sees first drop in candidates

China's national college entrance exam saw a decrease in candidates for the first time in the past seven years, said the Ministry of Education Tuesday. About 10.2 million people registered to attend the upcoming exam, down 3.8 percent year on year, according to the ministry. In contrast, candidates for the exam saw a continuous increase from 2002 to 2008, jumping from 5.27 million in 2002 to 10.5 million in 2008.

This year's examinees would have more opportunities to enter colleges as they would compete for 6.29 million seats in China's universities and colleges, up four percent from last year, the ministry's figure showed. About half of the country's provinces and regions earlier reported a decrease in candidate number. Figures from the National Bureau of Statistics showed the number of senior high school graduates decreased from 8.49 million last year to 8.34 million this year. It is estimated to be 8.03 million in 2010.

College graduates are having a hard time finding jobs this year as posts are being axed due to the economic slowdown. China has 6.11 million college students due to graduate this year, and one million from last year are still looking for jobs, according to the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security.

Known as "gao kao" in Chinese, the national college entrance exam, which falls on June 7 to 9 each year, is the largest examination in the world. The exam can change the candidates' lives in a fiercely competitive society. (Xinhua)

Consumption and household income reforms

China will fast track its payment system reforms to boost household income, especially those of the medium- and low-income group, and spur consumption, the State Council said on Monday. The cabinet Monday listed as many as nine steps to increase household income, according to a statement on the reform guidelines posted on its website.

Executives of State-owned enterprises may see their salaries trimmed to narrow the gap between the rich and the poor amid an economic slump that has put pressure on profits and wiped out millions of jobs, according to the statement. Other measures to encourage spending include an improved social security net, reduced precautionary savings, and increased income for rural and low-income households through fiscal transfers, it said.

Analysts said these measures would help boost consumption, which accounted for just 40 percent of China's GDP growth in 2008. "In the last few years the household income growth could not keep pace with the growth of treasury income and that of the national economy. As a result, consumption did not take off, " said Zhou Tianyong, professor from the Party School of the Central Committee of Communist Party of China.

According to Chang Xiuze, researcher, Academy of Macroeconomy Research, NDRC, China's labor payments have dropped to 11 percent of the GDP in 2007, compared to 17 percent in 1980. (China Daily/China.org.cn)

99 SOEs to recruit more graduates to ease job pressure

China's 99 centrally administered state-owned enterprises (SOEs) planed to recruit more than 203,000 graduates this year as to ease job pressure, the state-owned assets administrator said. The recruitment number is 7 percent more than that of the previous year.

The State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission (SASAC) said more than 45 centrally administered SOEs would increase their headcounts this year, while 30 of them would hire the same amount of graduates compared with last year.

China National Petroleum Corp., the country's largest oil and gas producer and supplier, has by far held more than 30 job fairs in universities. It planed to recruit 13,000 graduates this year, an increase of 37 percent year on year. China Railway Construction Corp., the nation's largest contractor, has recruited 13,000 graduates, an increase of more than 45 percent, or 4,060 people, compared with 2007. Among all the SOEs, the Commercial Aircraft Corp. saw the largest increase. It planned to recruit 1,362 graduates, which was 212 percent more than its previous plan.

The SASAC said it would strengthen supervision over the SOEs to put in place the recruitment. It also urged to further expand employment by offering more scientific research projects and probation jobs. (Xinhua/China.org.cn)

An end to the Chinese Dream?

Everyone's familiar with the American dream: work and study hard and you'll get ahead. But China has its own version, which hopeful parents and their children have adhered to ever since the emperor started meritocratic civil-service exams during the Han dynasty. Like the U.S. variant, the Chinese Dream places firm faith in hard work, but perhaps even greater faith in the value of an education, which promises to boost young people out of poverty and secure better lives for them and their families. This vision has had special appeal since Deng Xiaoping opened China to the world and getting rich became glorious.

Now, with China's white-hot economy cooling, millions of youngsters are facing the possibility that a good degree won't be enough. As 2008 wound down, 1.5 million new graduates were still jobless, according to the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. Suddenly, it seems, the Chinese Dream is under threat, and that's got Beijing plenty nervous. This was on stark display when Prime Minister Wen Jiabao met with students at a Beijing college in December. "If you are worried, I'm more worried than you," he told them, promising that ensuring their employment was at the top of his agenda, alongside finding jobs for laid-off factory workers. (Mary Hennock, Newsweek)

China's labor disputes doubled in 2008

According to Yang Zhiming, Vice Minister of Human Resources and Social Security, Chinese authorities accepted 693,000 labor dispute cases last year, 98 percent higher than a year earlier, as the economic downturn triggered production cuts and even bankruptcies. The cases involved more than 1.2 million workers, up 90 percent from the previous year. Of the total, 22,000 cases were collective labor disputes that involve more than three workers each. The number was up 71 percent year on year and each case involved 23 workers on average. Another 237,000 labor disputes were settled through mediation.