Buying jobs: hard-pressed China youth conned into paying US$28,000 or more in fees to secure employment as economy falters
- Fraudulent scammers rife on social media ‘sell’ jobs to struggling youth
- Youth unemployment, excluding students, reaches 14.9 per cent in China
Desperate for work young people in China are falling prey in increasing numbers to online scams promising them steady jobs in return for vast fees.
The illegal schemes are rampant on recruitment sites and social media platforms, such as Xiaohongshu, according to a report by Chinese media outlet Sina Tech in February.
The scammers disguise themselves as employment consulting companies and post details about well-paid job openings, sometimes with state-owned enterprises.
When young jobseekers applied to the companies they found out they would be charged for “services”.
The fee varies depending on the job being advertised and the type of company.
For example, a post with a big private firm could cost the jobseeker 10,000 yuan (US$1,400), while one at a state-owned company could be as much as 200,000 yuan. If a post at a state-owned company came with bian zhi, the fee could reach more than 450,000 yuan (US$63,300).
Bian zhi means a stable career with generous perks including a housing subsidy, a good retirement pension, minimal work, and most importantly, very little risk of becoming unemployed.
Beneath one Xiaohongshu post from a consulting company based in northeastern China’s Jilin province, dozens of commenters were requesting detailed information, with some asking about the fee.
The attractiveness of such job posts is understandable as China’s young navigate increasing competition for work amid the economic downturn and high youth unemployment.
The unemployment rate for young people aged 16 to 24, excluding students, was 14.9 per cent in December 2023.
The data was released after China’s Bureau of Statistics had suspended the publication of it for five months. On June 2023, the most recent data before the suspension, the figure was 21.3 per cent.
The number of people registering for the 2024 examination for admissions to the civil service, considered to be one of the most stable employers in China, reached a record-breaking 2.83 million, 330,000 more than the previous year.
The company in Jilin advertised the job’s monthly salary as 5,000 yuan to 8,000 yuan (US$1,125), slightly above its capital city’s average.
The company told jobseekers it could help them bypass the first round, which was a written examination, and promised they would go directly to the second round, which was an interview and would easily pass it.
However, the contract they asked jobseekers to sign revealed it was a scam.
It required them to pay the entire fee 48 hours before the interview, with the disclaimer that it “does not make any promise as to the results of the interviews”.
Beijing Jingsh Law Firm’s lawyer, Meng Bo, told Sina Tech that the contract is invalid because it has violated the law, and the companies have committed the crime of fraud by claiming to sell jobs.
