A pay rise for government workers sparks anger and envy in China

In China’s private sector, many complain that jobs and wages are being cut as the country’s economy flounders. So as news spread online in late December that people on the government payroll were being given a salary increase, some netizens were outraged. “Reminds me of a famous Soviet joke,” wrote one. “Brezhnev on stage says, ‘Our lives will get better and better.’ A worker in the audience asks, ‘What about ours?’” Life can be tough as a state employee, but envy of them is growing.

The government is keeping typically quiet about the pay rise. On social media, however, users have been confirming their pay packets are bigger (though some say they have not been notified). Those affected include civil servants as well as others paid by the government, such as teachers. The raise is hardly massive: a few tens of dollars per month, backdated to July, according to examples cited on the internet. It would amount to an increase of a few percent on their basic pay. But it appears to be the first hike since 2021. After several years of urging by the government that officials tighten their belts, it signals a little easing. Reuters, a news agency, reckons it could involve a one-off injection of between $12bn and $20bn into the economy.

That is handy as the government tries to boost consumption as a way of reviving growth. But China’s roughly 50m government workers may not be overjoyed. In recent years there have been widespread reports of cash-strapped local authorities delaying or cutting payments of other benefits. These extra remunerations usually exceed employees’ basic salary, says Alfred Wu of the National University of Singapore. Staff woes may abate as local governments benefit from a national campaign, launched last year, to stimulate the economy. It has involved allowing lower-tier administrations to refinance their crippling debts by issuing bonds worth up to 10trn yuan ($1.4trn) over the next five years. For now, though, morale appears patchy.

For the Communist Party, this is a problem. Government workers are the party’s backbone: more than 80% of government employees are party members, noted China’s leader, Xi Jinping, in 2016. They play a vital role in maintaining the party’s legitimacy. Ill-motivated ones are unlikely to perform it with vigour. Pay—even when received on time and in full—has often failed to reflect the amount of effort put in. So workers are putting in less effort. In 2022 two scholars from a party academy wrote of a growing tendency among officials to “lie flat” rather than work. State television, not known for its gibes at the bureaucracy, lampooned the lying-flat phenomenon in 2023 in its much-watched “Spring Festival Gala”, an annual programme on the eve of the lunar new year. Thousands posted approving comments on social media.

Mr Xi’s relentless anti-corruption campaign may have helped to improve the image of officials, but it may have also contributed to their lack of motivation. Opportunities for kickbacks have become scarcer. Fearful of being accused of graft, officials avoid getting involved in projects that might be linked with it. Morale has not been improved either by Mr Xi’s stepping up of political indoctrination among cadres. In recent years they have had to spend more time attending mind-numbing meetings to study his pronouncements and, out of hours, using a smartphone app that drills these lessons in. Points scored on the app can be reviewed by superiors and used to determine bonuses.

To make matters worse, in the past couple of years the party has been making it harder for government employees to travel abroad, even for private purposes. Now a wider range of people in non-sensitive jobs, such as academics and even primary-school teachers, have to hand their passports to officials for safekeeping. Getting the document back requires submitting a detailed explanation of the reason for travel. The tightening appears to relate to efforts to stop corrupt officials fleeing, and to prevent the leaking of secrets and contacts with overseas dissidents.

Government jobs remain coveted. In December a record 3.4m people sat the annual civil-service exam, about 400,000 more than in 2023. Fewer than one in 80 applicants were expected to succeed. It is clear why so many are keen: high youth unemployment and the increasing precariousness of work in private firms. But scorn is rampant, too. On January 8th much was vented at a district party leader in the south-western region of Chongqing who suggested that officials take the lead in reviving consumer spending by buying new clothes and taking their families out to meals. “Who wouldn’t spend money if they had it? Spending requires earning first,” said one. “The first big joke of the year,” another chimed in. Censors scrambled to stem the flood of cynicism. ■

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