China’s employment situation is severe, with the National Development and Reform Commission recently allocating an additional 10 billion yuan for the “employment through subsidizing work” initiative. This initiative claims to help 310,000 key disadvantaged groups nationwide find employment and increase income. However, experts have pointed out that the amount allocated per person per month is only around 1300 yuan, which is insufficient for basic survival. Coupled with corruption at all levels of government, the Chinese Communist Party’s “employment through subsidizing work” initiative is seen as merely a show.
“Employment through subsidizing work” refers to investing in infrastructure construction projects, where recipients participate in the construction work and receive labor remuneration instead of direct assistance policies.
According to a report by Xinhua News Agency on July 8, the Chinese Communist Party’s National Development and Reform Commission recently allocated 10 billion yuan to support 1975 small and medium-sized infrastructure projects in 26 provinces and cities for the initiative. The projects mainly target areas where there is an influx of returnees to rural areas and high demand for labor.
Official claims state that the initiative can help 310,000 key disadvantaged groups find employment, including impoverished individuals, those at risk of returning to poverty, returning enterprise employees, migrant workers returning to rural areas, and other rural laborers.
Chinese issues expert Wang He told Epoch Times that with the current economic downturn, a large number of migrant workers have returned to rural areas without much work to do, which could lead to social unrest. To maintain stability, authorities have resorted to the “employment through subsidizing work” initiative.
He believes this illustrates the challenges in sustaining the social assistance mechanisms established in rural areas and highlights the severe issues of absolute poverty and unemployment. It indirectly indicates that the Chinese Communist Party’s claimed economic growth rate of 5% is fabricated.
Officially, the Chinese government claims that the average urban unemployment rate nationwide from January to May was 5.2%. However, official figures have been criticized as inaccurate, and the actual number of unemployed individuals may be higher.
As of the end of June, the National Development and Reform Commission, in collaboration with the Ministry of Finance, has allocated a total of 29.5 billion yuan in central investment for the initiative in 2025, supporting nearly 6000 projects at the local level. It is expected to create employment opportunities for more than 700,000 disadvantaged individuals and disburse labor remuneration exceeding 11 billion yuan.
Tian Xie, a professor at the Darla Moore School of Business at the University of South Carolina, analyzed for Epoch Times, stating that investing 29.5 billion in 6000 projects is inadequate for meaningful impact. Distributing 11 billion in labor remuneration among over 700,000 individuals means each person receives around 15,000 yuan, equivalent to approximately 1300 yuan per month, barely enough for survival.
“Ordinary people’s average income should be around 3000 yuan, enough for basic needs. Exploiting the labor of migrant workers who work hard for less than 1500 yuan per month is essentially exploitation,” he said.
Public records show that “employment through subsidizing work” was a common relief measure used by the Chinese Communist Party in the 1950s to 1970s, alongside “self-help production.”
The policy was launched in 1984, and in 2005, the “National Regulations on Employment through Subsidizing Work” were issued, making it a poverty alleviation policy in rural China. A revised version was released in 2014 and became effective on March 1, 2023.
Chinese officials have compared the initiative to President Roosevelt’s employment initiatives during the economic depression in the United States in the 1930s to defend the Chinese Communist Party’s policy.
Wang He pointed out that while the “employment through subsidizing work” approach exists in various countries and even in ancient China, the current Chinese implementation is limited in scale and fails to address the vast number of individuals in need of assistance. In comparison to the large population of unemployed individuals and widespread poverty nationwide, the allocated funds by the Chinese Communist Party are more for show than effective relief efforts.
He further emphasized that the corruption at the grassroots level within the Chinese Communist Party raises doubts about how much of the allocated funds actually reach the impoverished individuals who need them.