China Suspends Youth Unemployment Data After New Highs

The Chinese government has suspended its release of youth unemployment data following six consecutive increases. As the following chart shows, unemployment among 16-to-24-year-olds in urban areas has been a growing problem in recent years. The share of people without a job has risen every month of 2023, reaching 21.3 percent in June - the highest figure on record since the data was first published in 2018.

These high unemployment figures are being cited as an indicator of concern for the Chinese economy, which is recovering slower than expected following the government’s end of its strict zero-Covid policy.

The decision to pause on publishing the data was announced last Tuesday, when Fu Linghui, a spokesman of the National Bureau of Statistics, said at a news briefing that the surveys used to collect the data “need to be further improved and optimized.” However, the move has received backlash online for a lack of transparency, with claims that the government is trying to hide an inconvenient truth.

According to Christian Textor, Statista’s Greater China Senior Researcher, these high figures partly are attributable to a growing cohort of graduates who often do not “fit the demand for more practically skilled work in the job market.” It’s an issue that has been exacerbated not only by the country’s zero-Covid policy and lockdowns, which hit private companies hard, but also by regulatory actions in the technology, real estate and education sectors, which led to job losses and have subsequently impacted hiring.

Wider issues too are at work here, as Textor explains, such as: “Covid-related after effects, a bad global economic situation, government pressure on the IT service sector, real estate crisis, geopolitical effects.”