China's 'full-time children' move back in with parents, take on chores as good jobs grow scarce

For free real time breaking news alerts sent straight to your inbox sign up to our breaking news emails Sign up to our free breaking news emails Sign up to our free breaking news emails SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. If “full-time adult children” were counted as unemployed, the jobless rate would be more than double the official rate of almost 20 percent in March, Zhang Dandan, a Peking University economics professor, said in an op-ed in the Chinese business magazine Caixin in July. “So for the only child of a family, who received education, who grew up in a so-called time of abundance, it’s very difficult to embrace that kind of job.” An abundance of good jobs has been a mainstay of the social contract between the ruling party and young Chinese, Xiang said. Resorting to the usual Communist Party exhortations to toughen up, in June Chinese President Xi Jinping urged young people to “eat bitterness” – or endure hardship – “to create a better China.” Earlier this year, the Communist Youth League urged college graduates to “roll up their sleeves” and take up blue-collar jobs. CHANGING EXPECTATIONS Instead of eating bitterness, Xiang said, “full-time adult children” are taking advantage of the wealth accumulated by their parents to sit out the job drought, rest up and prepare for exams for relatively stable government jobs or for postgraduate studies.