Courtesy of Mish.
In response to Pettis on China, Europe, Japan: Bad News for Those Looking for Growth reader “BC” passed on a series of articles about jobs and wages, and matching up graduates with the skills companies seek.
The articles are all in regards to China. Change the names and faces, and the stories sound to me like things you could easily read here.
The problems are universal: too many graduates, trained in fields where there are no jobs or few openings.
Job Prospects for China’s Grads Bleak
Business Times says Job Prospects for China’s Grads Bleak.
A record seven million students will graduate from universities and colleges across China in the coming weeks, but their job prospects appear bleak – the latest sign of a troubled Chinese economy.
Businesses say they are swamped with job applications but have few positions to offer as economic growth has begun to falter.
The Chinese government is worried, saying the problem could affect social stability, and it has ordered schools, government agencies and state-owned enterprises to hire more graduates at least temporarily to help relieve joblessness.
“The only thing that worries them more than an unemployed, low-skilled person is an unemployed, educated person,” said Wei Shang-Jin, a Columbia Business School economist.
Lu Mai, secretary- general of the elite, government- backed China Development Research Foundation, acknowledged in a speech this month that fewer than half of this year’s graduates had found jobs so far.
China quadrupled the number of students enrolled in universities and colleges over the last decade. But its economy is still driven by manufacturing, with a preponderance of blue-collar jobs.
Premier Li Keqiang himself led the Cabinet meeting on May 16 that produced the directive for schools, government agencies and state-owned enterprises to hire more graduates, a strategy that has been used with increasing frequency in recent years to absorb jobless but educated youths.
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