Youth is China’s economic futureBy Nancy QianIn May this year, China reported that unemployment among those aged 16 to 24 had reached a record-breaking 20.8 percent, with the high-paying, high-skilled jobs that university graduates are trained for growing scarcer. Chinese students and their parents are finding this new economic reality difficult to accept, given the tremendous sacrifices they have made for higher education. All this is done with the expectation of enjoying future security in a rapidly growing economy — except that economic growth has waned. Young women tend to suffer more than young men in the labor market. To stem the reversal of its economic fortunes, China must address the root of the problem: the lack of high-paying, high-skilled jobs.
