Young in no hurry to find job with comforts of home
(China Daily)
Updated: 2004-04-26 08:51

SHANGHAI: Why work when you can stay at home?

That's what seems to be happening, at least in some cases, despite the worries of parents, job counsellors, and training programmes doing their best to find jobs for a growing number of China's unemployed young people.

Many such jobless youth in this metropolis are reluctant to take jobs in spite of their parents' on-going concerns, and the best efforts of officials at training centres, authorities say.

Xia Xin, a consultant in the Shanghai-based Youyi Human Resource Consulting Company, said some "young unemployed are not eager to find a job, since most of them are still fully supported by their family and don't worry about money issues."

Indeed,officials are finding that more than 60 per cent of the phone calls that come in to job centres to inquire about government-sponsored training programmes for unemployed youth are not from the unemployed young people, but from their parents.

More than a third of those who register for the training courses do not even show up, frustrating officials in charge of the programmes.

Unemployed young people in the metropolis - classified as those 35 and below - total 300,000. Most live in the suburbs.

Xia describes the group as doted upon by their parents, with little sense of responsibility or courage to face life by themselves.

Many are indifferent to the training courses that have been set up for them, a sharp contrast from their parents.

Human resources analysts in various sectors across the city said they find the attitude of the young nowadays in Shanghai less mature than previous generations.

To help the unemployed, the municipality is helping hundreds of thousands find jobs via training programmes amid forecasts that more grown-ups and college graduates will enter the already tight labour market.

Meanwhile, officials urge young people to better recognize the situation and take a more active attitude.

Shanghai Municipal Labour and Social Security Bureau launched a programme in March to train 10,000 people out of the 300,000 young unemployed and plans to train more in the next two years.

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