Chinese reforms bring austerity
By Max Lane
Rising unemployment and declining living standards are becoming more and more a feature of the conditions of the working class in China, according to a recent issue of the Hong Kong-based journal October Review.
Unemployment was acknowledged as a long-term problem by minister of labour Yuan Chongwu in July 1992, when he told a conference that the "oversupply of labour power" would remain an acute problem "in the coming period".
According to the labour minister, there were 36 million people in the cities looking for work, plus another 10 million "surplus labour" in enterprises and 100 million "surplus" workers in the countryside.
October Review identified several of the Deng Xiaoping reform policies that have exacerbated unemployment. These included a new labour contract system that tended to eliminate from the work force "weaker" categories of workers, such as the sick, the aged and females.
Another widespread policy was forced "internal retirement". Newspapers such as the Beijing Workers Daily have reported cases in which all workers over a certain age, in one case 35 and another 47, were forced to retire. Workers forced to accept "internal retirement" have to live on a pension from their enterprise many times less than the full wage. These ":internal pensions" are even less than the normal government pension for those retiring at the normal retirement age.
The more rigorous implementation in recent months of a new Bankruptcy Law has resulted in many enterprises closing down and workers being dismissed. The example is given of the largest state-run textile factory in south-west China: the Chongqing Textile General factory was declared bankrupt by the court, and around 3,,000 workers lost their jobs and income. The factory still owed about 3 million yuan of workers' wages and superannuation money.
Another cause of sackings is the shift of ownership of some enterprises to private capitalists through a share market. As Hong Kong capitalists buy into formerly state-owned companies on the mainland, there are frequently moves to sack large numbers of the workers.
A Hong Kong TV program in November, for example, profiled the
case of the Number Two Dyeing Factory in Shanghai, which, after selling 51% of its shares to a new Hong Kong shareholder, lost 1200 of its 2000 employees. Many of these were "internally retired" on pensions one-third of their previous wages.
Working hours were also increased from 8 to 10 hours a day, compulsory overtime increased, free meals and other amenities abolished and the in-house factory health service greatly reduced.
October Review pointed to a number of letters to the editor and commentaries in the Workers Daily which voiced concerns at these developments or indirectly indicated rising levels of discontent by referring to workers "lacking the correct understanding of the reforms and cannot adapt to the changes" and who were exhibiting attitudes of scepticism and fear.