What’s next for China’s first eldercare graduates? For some, not eldercare
“As far as we know, about 70 per cent of students have a strong desire to stay and work in elderly care companies, which we are very pleased about,” Yan said.
Shanghai University of Engineering Science did not respond to a Post request for similar data about their graduates.
Since the first two universities launched their degree programmes, several others have rolled out similar courses, including Zhejiang Shuren University and Guangdong Open University.
Whether and how long the graduates stay in the sector will be closely watched, as Beijing tries to kill two birds with one stone – employing more young people and providing care for a rapidly ageing population – by nudging those young people to consider unpopular, but essential, fields like eldercare.
About 15.4 per cent of China’s population was aged 65 and above in 2023, according to the Ministry of Civil Affairs, and the Economist Intelligence Unit has projected that this figure could rise to 25 per cent by 2035. But demand for eldercare services far exceeds supply. Nationwide, the industry currently employs around 500,000 carers, far short of the estimated 6 million it needs.
With youth joblessness another pressing issue - the unemployment rate for the 16-24 age group reached 14.7 per cent in April - Beijing has been trying to steer its glut of young jobseekers to the care sector.
For years, several provinces have tried to lure young people to the industry with incentives like subsidies and sign-on bonuses, reaching as much as 60,000 yuan (US$8,300) in Liaoning and Beijing. Some nursing homes have launched schemes offering food, lodging and a stipend to young people who serve as companions to the residents.
But even though a record 11.79 million university students are expected to graduate this year, compounding the competition for jobs, experts said few might be willing to overlook care work’s reputation for being a badly paid, difficult and low-status profession.
“Even with high youth unemployment and underemployment, [eldercare] is just not the first choice for many young people. If you’re a 22-year-old college graduate who just wants a salary, there are much easier ways to do this than working in the care sector,” said Professor Stuart Gietel-Basten of the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, who researches ageing and population policy in Asia.
“Degree courses like this are a good first step in showing that there is proper training and that eldercare is a proper vocation, but the sector needs to show that people will be rewarded and treated properly,” he said.
At a Politburo study session on Monday, President Xi Jinping urged graduates to consider working for grassroots organisations and small or medium businesses, and called for a mindset change around “correct views of employment”.
“We need to conduct an in-depth analysis on why there are labour gaps in some industries,” he was quoted by Xinhua as saying. “We can start from solving the problem of a ‘lack of workers in some positions’, and then move on to the issue of ‘some people have no work’.”
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Shandong Women’s University expects its graduates to earn a monthly salary of about 5,000 yuan (US$690) post-tax, said Yan, the dean. Many employers cover food and accommodation, and students should be eligible for better-paid management roles within about two or three years of graduating, he added.
Whether the graduates who join the industry can be persuaded to stay is a further challenge, Lu Jiehua, a sociology professor and director of the Centre for Healthy Ageing and Family Studies at Peking University, told the state broadcaster.
“If the prestige of the job does not improve, people will not stay,” he said, adding that pay for care workers has to be “decent” and commensurate with their labour.
The under-valuation of care work, including eldercare, is a worldwide problem, said Gietel-Basten of HKUST. Various studies on the situation in China have estimated that the value of unpaid care work - the bulk of which is done by women, including housework, child care and eldercare - ranges between 22 and 45 per cent of the nation’s gross domestic product.
In January, the Ministry of Civil Affairs, along with several other ministries, announced the development of an eight-tier professional title scale for the eldercare sector, along with other schemes to recognise skills and academic qualifications.
“The people who make the best carers are the ones who have a passion for it, but you can’t just rely on that,” said Gietel-Basten.