A recent sample survey shows that, currently, it is not easy for
the unemployed to find new jobs in China. The survey was conducted
in late August by the Ministry of Labor and Social Security among
people in 10 large cities - Shenyang, Qiqihar,
Nanjing,
Hefei, Zhengzhou, Yichang, Changsha,
Chengdu,
Guiyang and Xi’an.
It
showed that half of the unemployed were people aged below 35. More
than half had lost their jobs because of enterprises having to lay
off employees to survive, or because their work contracts had
expired. Thirty percent of the unemployed had never had any jobs,
and more than 10 percent simply had no desire to work any
longer.
About 70 percent of the unemployed had participated in
re-employment training, and half of them thought the training was
useful in helping them find jobs, according to the survey. Matters
of interest to everybody included unemployment insurance, ways to
quickly find a job, and a stable social guarantee system.
Among the surveyed laid-off workers, most were poorly educated and
with heavy family responsibilities. Nearly 40 percent expected to
find jobs through social re-employment service centers in the
latter half of the year. Some 70 percent were involved in various
kinds of debts with their original workplaces, for instance, they
failed to get the wages and reimbursement of their medical
expenses.
Besides, people are moving from rural to urban areas in response to
higher wages, but once there, they are competing with redundant
urban workers for jobs.
Chen Gang, a leading financial official of the Ministry of Labor
and Social Security, said that the government would adopt active
measures to straighten out the relationship between labor and
capital, clear debts between enterprises and laid-off workers, and
strengthen the social guarantee system.
“Governments at all levels will provide more professional training
and preferential policies for the unemployed to promote labor
guarantee work,” promised Chen.
In
addition to the survey, statistics from Shanghai,
the largest city of China, shows that the number of registered
unemployed workers reached 200,800 last year, an official
unemployment rate of 3.5 percent.
In
the next five years, China’s total new labor supply is estimated at
52 million, but the country’s industries can only offer about 40
million jobs, according to the Ministry of Labor and Social
Security.
(China.org.cn 09/06/2001)