Chinese youth give up on their futures Recently, there have been a series of indiscriminate violent incidents targeting civilians in China. One of the main factors seems to be that China’s worsening economic environment is increasing people’s anxiety. The real estate bubble that had supported economic growth until now has collapsed, and China’s economic growth is reaching its limits. In particular, employment opportunities for young people have decreased and economic disparities have widened. A combination of factors such as dissatisfaction with low wages and fears of unemployment has resulted in China’s social psychological situation becoming unstable. There has been an increase in posts on social networking services (SNS) in China about unemployment, failure to find a job, and worries about life. The so-called “lying down people” believe that it is difficult to achieve a good future through self-help, and so one could say that they are protesting silently by doing nothing. With no bright prospects for the future, an increasing number of young people appear to be giving up on life. In order to prevent social instability, the Chinese government launched a “shared prosperity policy” and expanded employment measures for young people and others. However, no notable results have been achieved so far. As the collapse of the bubble makes it difficult to dream about the future, an increasing number of individuals and companies become hypersensitive to risk and place importance on maintaining the status quo. In that case, it will be difficult to realize new ideas (innovation). Symbolizing the unstable social sentiment, the yuan has been clearly falling in the foreign exchange market since around October. The government and central bank appear to be managing the exchange rate of the yuan to prevent it from falling too far, but selling pressure on the yuan is currently quite strong. It is expected that the Trump administration in the United States will further tighten its crackdown on China in the future. There are concerns that the Chinese economy’s slump will continue for a long time and people’s psychological state will deteriorate further. The yuan reflects uncertainty about the future Every business day, the People’s Bank of China announces the base rate for that day’s transactions at around 10:15 a.m. Japan time. The benchmark exchange rate is important for ascertaining the Chinese government’s exchange rate policy (such as whether it places more importance on a weak or strong yuan). At present, the central bank has set the base rate stronger than the actual market rate (weak dollar, strong yuan) in order to prevent the yuan from falling. The government appears to be trying to guide the yuan below 7.20 to the dollar. However, in actual transactions, the exchange rate remained above 1 dollar = 7.20 yuan (the dollar was stronger and the yuan weaker than the benchmark rate). On December 3rd, the yuan fell to 7.2791 yuan per dollar on the Shanghai foreign exchange market, the lowest level in about a year and a month. One of the reasons for the yen’s depreciation is the increasing policy risks in the United States. On November 25, US President-elect Donald Trump indicated his intention to impose an additional 10% tariff on Chinese goods. Concerns about future price increases are likely to put upward pressure on U.S. interest rates. Additionally, within China, the collapse of the real estate bubble is raising concerns about deflation. New home prices continue to decline. For now, there are no signs that the real estate market is really going to stop declining. Local government finances are deteriorating due to a decline in profits from the transfer of land use rights. Private consumption is weak due to the burden of mortgage repayments, falling values of homes and stocks, and the negative wealth effect. China’s government bond yields have fallen, widening the interest rate gap between the United States and China. The instability in social sentiment in China is also believed to have been one of the factors behind the selling of the yuan. In November, several violent incidents occurred in China, including car crashes. Each time such an incident was reported, selling pressure on the yuan seemed to increase. It appears that the number of investors buying dollars and selling yuan has increased, wary of a worsening outlook for China both politically and economically (rising China risk). The worsening economic environment and growing anxiety about the future: China’s social psychology is destabilizing, as can be seen in social media posts. In November, a Chinese influencer with 8 million followers uploaded a video in which he commented, “Is it true that even graduates of famous universities have a hard time finding a job?” and “There are too many posts on social media about finding a job.” The post was met with a flood of criticism on social media, with people claiming that the person did not fully understand the harshness of the job market that young people face, and it sparked outrage. There was also a contrasting case. As the government tightens its grip on the cram school industry, people who have left related fields have been posting on social media about their unemployment situations. It caused an unexpected reaction. The posts mainly described daily life of an unemployed person and advice for other unemployed people, which resonated with many young people who find themselves in the same situation. As it has become more difficult to find work in high-paying industries such as cutting-edge IT fields, the number of young people aspiring to become civil servants is also rapidly increasing. Even though the worsening finances have led to even civil servants being subject to restructuring, there is a flood of applicants. Akio Makabe (Special Visiting Professor, Tama University).
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I wish a democratization movement would break out across the country and it would split into four parts. Manchukuo, Tibet, Uyghur, Beijing, Shanghai, other ethnic minority states, and Inner Mongolia were merged into Mongolia.
>>19 It’s on a different level from Japan At least in Japan, if you don’t get selfish and have a labor shortage, you won’t die of unemployment In the world of the gods of Great China, there’s no work and you’ll starve to death.
Strange, even among party members, less than half are watching?
The TV drama “Northwest Years,” which depicts the exploits of Xi Zhongxun, father of Chinese President Xi Jinping, flopped with an average viewer rating of 3.1%. Maybe viewers disliked the “propaganda-like” feel?
>>54 If that happens, real estate will crash and we will have to deal with bad debts. Well, it’s already crashed. Black market prices are half the price in big cities and 1/3 the price in medium-sized cities.
Even at this late date, the incompetent Japanese government is allowing Chinese people into the country without restrictions, making them buy real estate, and giving them driver’s licenses with hotel addresses. They’re complete idiots, even subsidizing BYD.
It’s typical of China that the criticism isn’t directed at the government. I imagine the psychological barrier to opposing the government is unusually high compared to other countries.
>>65 The China that Japan admired in the past wasn’t like that, but since the Chinese Communist Party, especially after the Cultural Revolution and the Tiananmen Square incident, it has become a country where people fear massacres.
If Chinese agents or people who support China see this, they will either say “Don’t watch this”, mutter to themselves and deny it, or cut off the discussion by comparing it to Japan, I wonder?
Applications for civil servants are flooding in lol. It seems that civil servants are the ones who aren’t getting paid and are being asked to return the wages they’ve already paid?
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