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A citizen's right to work is the essential condition for his right
to subsistence. Without the right to work, there will be no guarantee
for the right to subsistence. The Constitution and the law provide
that citizens have the right to work, rest, receive vocational training
and be paid for their labor and that they have the right to labor
protection and social security.
Having a job is the direct embodiment of the right to work. In
China, with its large population and weak economy, employment is
an outstanding social issue. In old China, corruption on the part
of the Kuomintang government and the civil war it unleashed led
the national economy to overall collapse and the bankruptcy of large
numbers of industrial and commercial enterprises. By the beginning
of 1948, 70-80 percent of the factories in Tianjin had shut down;
in Guangdong, the number of factories shrank from more than 400
to less than 100; and in Shanghai, numerous factories were closed
down and the 3,000-odd factories that survived had to run at 20
percent of their normal capacity. Numerous workers lost their jobs
as a result of the massive number of industrial and commercial closedowns.
By 1949, the year the nation was liberated, 4,742,000 workers, or
60 percent of the nation's total, were jobless. Such was the heavy
social burden New China inherited from the old society.
After the founding of New China, the people's government attached
great importance to this problem and took various practical measures
to ensure employment. In less than four years, virtually all the
unemployed left over from old China started work again. Since then,
with the annual population growth of 14 million, employment has
always been a cardinal issue in China's economic life. For a considerably
long period of time, job-waiting people in urban areas basically
counted on the government for job placements and most of them were
employed in public works. Since the policy of reform and opening
to the outside world was adopted in 1979, China has instituted a
multi-ownership economic system with public ownership of the means
of production taking the dominant position. The employment system
whereby the state assigns virtually all the jobs has been revamped
and the principle has been carried out to open up all avenues for
job opportunities by combining the efforts in three fields--job
placements by labor departments, employment in enterprises organized
by those who need jobs, and self-employment. Labor companies have
been established in the service of job-seekers, and vocational training
has been expanded to improve the laborer's qualities and provide
them with as many job opportunities as possible. To solve the problem
of employment of the rural surplus labor force resulting from the
development of production and the improvement of productivity, the
government has devoted major efforts to setting up rural enterprises
and encouraged farmers to develop industrial and sideline occupations
along specialized lines and on a household basis. Thus those farmers
who have quit farming can have work to do without leaving their
villages. Meanwhile, plans have been made for some of the surplus
laborers to work in cities. In the economic rectification designed
to raise the economic efficiency of enterprises and deepen their
reform, a number of enterprises have been closed down, suspended,
merged or switched to other lines of production in the last couple
of years. The government, attaching great importance to the resettlement
of the workers in these enterprises, has provided short- or medium-term
training so that they can adapt to their new jobs quickly. In 1990,
the number of workers in urban and rural areas reached 567 million,
about 3.1 times what it was in 1949; the number of employees in
cities and towns topped 147.3 million, 9.6 times that in 1949; and
the urban and rural unemployment rate stood at only 2.5 percent.
In old China, women, who accounted for half of the nation's total
population, not only suffered class oppression, but also had no
right in the family, because of failure to gain economic independence.
Those who were able to find jobs in society were subjected to every
kind of discrimination. In New China, women enjoy the same right
to work as men. The government devotes major efforts to developing
social welfare, including nurseries and kindergartens, and encourages
women to take up jobs, enabling them to acquire economic as well
as political independence. The state law and policies provide special
protection for women's employment. The Constitution provides the
principle of equal pay for equal work to men and women alike. The
government labor department intervenes and ensures that the mistake
is corrected promptly whenever women are found to be discriminated
against in their work units, and it stipulates that women get their
normal pay during maternity leave. As a result, the number of employed
women has been increased steadily, and their field of employment
constantly expanding. Nowadays, women's employment rate has exceeded
96 percent in town and the countryside, trailing behind that of
men's by less than two percentage points.
College graduates' employment is fully guaranteed in China. The
situation is a far cry from old China, when graduation was synonymous
to unemployment for college students. Since the founding of New
China, the government has followed the policy of unified job assignment
for all college graduates and thus ensured that every one of them
has the opportunity to work. In the past 10 years, the government
has reformed the job assignment system by combining the students'
own choices with the state's guarantee of jobs. The state sees to
it that, in light of the needs of various areas in economic development,
every college graduate is provided with a suitable job on a voluntary
basis. This is why unemployment is out of the question for college
graduates in China.
In socialist China, the government guarantees the basic necessities
of every worker and his family and sees to it that their life gradually
improves with economic growth. Although Chinese workers have relatively
low monetary wages, they enjoy a large amount of subsidies, including
financial subsidies for housing, children's attendance at nursery
and school and staple and non-staple foods, as well as social insurance
such as medical treatment, industrial injury and retirement pension
and many other welfare items, which are not counted in the wages.
Statistics indicate that urban residents in China pay only 3-5 percent
of their living expenses for housing, communication and medical
treatment. Since China carried out reforms in 1979, past payment
measures have been modified. On the basis of economic growth and
labor-productivity increase, workers' wage levels have been raised
proportionally. Therefore, the wage levels of workers have increased
rapidly, and there has been an obvious improvement in the consumption
level of all Chinese residents. Statistics in 1990 showed that the
average consumption level per capita of urban residents had increased
from 149 yuan in 1952 to 1,442 yuan, an inflation-adjusted increase
of 3.8 times.
China pays close attention to labor protection and has issued 1,682
laws, rules and regulations in 29 categories in this regard, while
28 provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities directly under
the central government have their own local laws and regulations
for labor protection. In addition, 452 articles of state technical
standards regarding occupational safety and hygiene have been enacted
throughout the country. China has established a state supervision
system insuring labor safety, hygiene, protection for female workers
and a work-hour and vacation schedule. So far more than 2,700 labor
supervision institutions have been set up throughout China with
some 30,000 supervisory personnel. The duty of the supervision institutions
is to monitor the work of enterprises and their management with
regard to labor safety and hygiene so as to stimulate the enterprises
to improve working conditions constantly.
China adopts the policy of "safety first and prevention first"
in labor protection, and combines state inspection with enterprise
management and worker supervision. The government requires that
10 to 20 percent of the enterprise's annual renovation fund be used
for labor safety and hygiene. Labor protection is regarded by the
state as an important factor in appraising the management skill
of an enterprise. In cases of casualties, an investigation will
be conducted to look into the responsibility of the leaders and
personnel concerned.
China provides free medical service in the urban state institutions
and undertakings and co-operative medical service in most rural
areas. Thus both urban and rural workers are assured of medical
care. Those wounded or disabled on the job are provided living expenses
from the state or the collective. In order to raise the level of
labor protection, China has set up many testing centers for occupational
safety and hygiene and labor-safety education offices. Dozens of
universities have established safety-engineering departments. Labor
and industry departments have set up scores of scientific research
institutes which attempt to strengthen labor safety and improve
working conditions for workers through scientific research, designing,
production, usage and management. Compared with the Sixth Five-Year
Plan period (1981-85), these efforts resulted in a 9.53 percent
decrease in on-duty deaths and a 37.95 percent decrease in serious
injury in state-owned and large collective enterprises during the
Seventh Five-Year Plan period (1986-90).
The Chinese government pays special attention to the protection
of female workers. In July 1988, the State Council promulgated Regulations
on Labor Protection of Female Workers, laying down specific guidelines.
For example, it is forbidden to make female workers engage in particularly
strenuous work or work harmful to their physiological well-being.
Also stipulated are concrete protections for female workers during
the menstrual period, and also during pregnancy, maternity leave
and breast-feeding, at which periods, their basic wages must remain
the same and their work-contracts cannot be terminated. In recent
years, a special fund has been established in many places to offer
living subsidies to women during breast-feeding and leave.
Chinese workers are the masters of their enterprises. Workers'
interests are closely connected with the enterprises' prosperity,
and there is no conflict of fundamental interests between the managers
and the workers. This reality determines that China's system of
protecting workers' rights is different from that under the wage-labor
system. According to China's Law Concerning the Industrial Enterprises
Owned by the Whole People, workers can directly participate in the
formulation and supervision of regulations concerning the enterprise's
operation, management, labor, personnel, wage, welfare, social security,
collective welfare, etc. through the workers congress. China's trade
unions play a particularly important role in the protection of workers'
right to work. Since China adopted the policy of reform and opening
to the outside world in 1979, trade unions have accomplished the
following five tasks: They have, first, actively practiced and improved
the system of workers' congresses; second, set up various workers'
schools to perfect the education system; third, organized labor
emulation drives and mobilized workers and staff to overfulfill
state plans; fourth, protected workers' material and spiritual interests
and guaranteed their welfare; and fifth, set up committees to deal
with labor disputes.
In July 1987, the State Council issued the Interim Rules on Labor
Disputes in State-Owned Enterprises. Aimed at readjusting labor
relations in state-owned enterprises, this administrative law deals
with disputes arising from the implementation of labor contracts
and the dismissal of workers who violate discipline. Institutions
specialized in handling these disputes include the enterprise labor
dispute mediation committee, local labor dispute arbitration committee
and the people's court. Most disputes are resolved through mediation
by the committees. Only a minority of cases are settled through
arbitration or by the people's court. Incomplete statistics show
that in 1990 enterprise labor dispute mediation committees and local
labor dispute arbitration committees throughout China handled 18,573
labor dispute cases and settled 16,813, of which 15,881 were settled
through mediation with a success rate as high as 94 percent. Only
932 cases were settled through arbitration, about 6 percent of the
total decided cases. There were only 218 cases settled through court
suit after arbitration failed, accounting for about 1.2 percent
of the total number of completed cases.
The Chinese government attaches great importance to labor legislation.
In accordance with the Constitution, the State Council and state
labor administration departments have promulgated laws and regulations
regarding wages, welfare, worker safety and health, as well as vocational
training and grading, working and resting hours, trade unions and
democratic management of enterprises. At present, the drafting of
a labor law is under way.
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