Rising unemployment in China is pushing millions of college graduates into a tough bargain, with some forced to accept low-paying work or even subsist on their parents' pensions, a plight that has created a new working class of "rotten-tail kids". The phrase has become a social media buzzword this year, drawing parallels to the catchword "rotten-tail buildings" for the tens of millions of unfinished homes that have plagued China's economy since 2021. A record number of college graduates this yea

BEIJING (Reuters) - Rising unemployment in China is pushing millions of college graduates into a tough bargain, with some forced to accept low-paying work or even subsist on their parents’ pensions, a plight that has created a new working class of “rotten-tail kids”.

The phrase has become a social media buzzword this year, drawing parallels to the catchword “rotten-tail buildings” for the tens of millions of unfinished homes that have plagued China’s economy since 2021.

A record number of college graduates this year are hunting for jobs in a labour market depressed by COVID-19-induced disruptions as well as regulatory crack-downs on the country’s finance, tech and education sectors.

The jobless rate for the roughly 100 million Chinese youth aged 16-24 crept above 20% for the first time in April last year. When it hit an all-time high of 21.3% in June 2023, officials abruptly suspended the data series to reassess how numbers were compiled.

  • CanadaPlus@lemmy.sdf.orgEnglish
    12·
    3 months ago

    Man, they really can’t seem to post that, even just to “debunk” it. I wonder why? Is there some kind of auto-ban? Some of them really do believe what they’re saying.

    • ravhallEnglish
      11·
      3 months ago

      Probably the phrase is monitored by their government, and will land them in jail.

    • cecinestpasunbot@lemmy.mlEnglish
      11·
      3 months ago

      There’s no point jumping through hoops for someone whose mind is already made up about you. It’s more fun for everyone if we just get into emoji fights and post snarky comments.

      • CanadaPlus@lemmy.sdf.orgEnglish
        1·
        3 months ago

        Yeah, but like, if you would put in a little quote of it, and then explain why it’s wrong, the TSM couldn’t be used as some kind of magic charm like this. As it is, everyone’s thinking you must be under duress.

        • cecinestpasunbot@lemmy.mlEnglish
          2·
          3 months ago

          As it is, everyone’s thinking you must be under duress.

          Do people seriously think that? Chinese censorship doesn’t work like that. They don’t care if one of their citizens uses a VPN to post about how the Tiananmen Square Massacre actually happened anonymously on some random foreign website. It’s baffling to me that anyone would think that they do.

          The reality usually is that asking to copy and paste something vaguely tangential to the conversation at hand just comes across as dismissive and infantilizing. Most people don’t want to jump through hoops to be taken seriously and so they don’t engage further. Assuming that they don’t want to engage because they’re under duress is just letting your confirmation bias run wild.

          • CanadaPlus@lemmy.sdf.orgEnglish
            1·
            3 months ago

            There you go!

            Do people seriously think that?

            I was starting to wonder. Maybe it’s confirmation bias, but in my experience you folks don’t tend to shy away when flamed.

            • cecinestpasunbot@lemmy.mlEnglish
              2·
              3 months ago

              I’ll only jumps through hoops for you CanadaPlus 😉

              in my experience you folks don’t tend to shy away when flamed.

              Well I think like most people online MLs aren’t above posting snarky replies or acting dismissive especially when confronted by the same attitudes. Most know that countering disinformation or trying to organize for their political aims online is generally a waste of time.