Job creation bedrock for economic growth

Data recently released by the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security shows that 12.44 million new jobs were created in China last year.

China attaches great importance to employment, and is doing everything possible to stabilize the employment situation. Since 2020, despite increasing uncertainties in economic operations, the country has still added more than 11 million new jobs every year. Statistics show that from 2020 to 2022, the number of new jobs created each year was 11.86 million, 12.69 million and 12.06 million respectively. It should be said that steady employment has contributed tremendously to stabilizing growth.

However, it must be noted that the current employment pressure is still great, and the structural employment contradictions of “difficulty in recruiting” and “difficulty in finding a job“are still prominent in some industries.

On the supply side, China’s total labor supply remains at a high level. The number of college graduates nationwide in 2024 is expected to reach 11.79 million, a year-on-year increase of 210,000. That means despite the nation’s low birth rate these years, the total labor supply these years is still ample. It will take several years before the country faces a real labor shortage.

On the demand side, the trend of industrial upgrading has prompted companies to pay more attention to the adoption of new technologies to save labor costs. In particular, the wide use of digital technology and artificial intelligence has put forward higher requirements for the quality of the workforce.

The abundant supply of labor shows that country still has rich labor resources while the overall education, skills and organization levels of its workers are becoming much higher than before.

Industrial upgrading and the widespread application of new technologies demonstrate that the economic structure is adjusting in the desired direction, which prioritizes efficiency, innovation and quality, rather than scale, resources and quantity.