Recently, a video of a student from Tsinghua University doing experiments on a laptop while riding a bicycle back to his room went viral. According to some Tsinghua students, it is common for them to eat dinner or study while riding to save time. A new word – involution – has become popular in China since 2020 to describe the phenomenon of young people being locked in endless competition, although no amount of effort is likely to better their prospects. An increasing number of Chinese students are going abroad to study, trying to escape the intensely competitive educational environment and labour market. Tensions have developed between those who have gone abroad and those who remain in China, evident in the comments on socials media posts. While this problem is tricky, it fundamentally stems from the uneven opportunities for education in China and abroad. While working as an intern at a Chinese tech company, I experienced the infamous 996 work culture – toiling from 9am to 9pm, six days a week – for a monthly wage of only around 3,000 yuan (US$440). Thinking back, I cannot understand how I endured that environment for so long. Given the heavy work pressure and low pay, it’s no wonder that moving abroad is a tempting proposition for many young people. In fields like computer science and engineering, the starting salary in the United States can be five times more than that in China, for example. Moreover, people who work abroad also tend to have a better work-life balance as a number of jobs in China have extremely long working hours . Unsurprisingly, a report by the Centre for Security and Emerging Technology at Georgetown University found that more than 90 per cent of Chinese PhD students in STEM subjects (science, technology, engineering and maths) in the US between 2000 and 2015 were still living in the country in 2017. However, many Chinese are still reluctant to relocate, largely due to a lack of English proficiency and strong attachment to the country, especially among the older generation. To overcome the first hurdle, parents have begun to send their children abroad at a young age to improve their English. There has long been resentment against the rich in China, and studying abroad is associated with wealth. Education abroad is certainly not cheap. While many middle-class families use a good portion of their savings to send their children to universities outside China, most families cannot afford the high costs. Social media posts by students abroad describing a lifestyle that seems luxurious to people back home have become the target of ire. As a result, international students are accused of being too wealthy or unpatriotic. The assumption is that they are rich, when a large chunk of them are actually from middle-class families. During the Covid-19 pandemic, there has been a resurgence of ill-feeling towards students abroad. Around the time I managed to get a plane ticket to return home, a few months after the pandemic began, I noticed many posts online about how students who went abroad should not come back to China and increase the burden on the country. With skyrocketing flight ticket prices and the unpredictable circuit-breaker policy, I felt like my country did not want me back. Some social media users would cheer when the government suspended another plane route, others referred to those who went abroad during the pandemic as “fake Chinese”. Those abroad retorted that their critics were simply jealous. Often, these disputes got heated. The prejudice against Chinese students abroad is rooted in social inequality and unhealthy competition. It will only disappear either when most people can afford to seek job opportunities abroad or when the working conditions in China match those overseas. This is unlikely to happen in the short term. So, in the meantime, a little understanding from those back home would go a long way. Zihang Xia is studying computer science and mathematics at New York University Abu Dhabi