Each morning, they march to work, in coffee shops, training centres, import/export companies, hairdressers, even art galleries, and then, plain old retail. Each night, they return to their tiny apartments, cramped on account that as many as six may share a bed. Together, they are a veritable army. They are the ant tribe.
On paper, these young Chinese soldiers are over qualified for such positions. All have a degree to their name and all believe they will one day become part of the country’s burgeoning middle class that buys homes and cars, then takes holidays abroad. The problem is, few are going to make it.
For, just as with their six-legged moniker, there are just two many members of the ant tribe. In order for China’s big development push in the 1990s and 2000s to succeed, the country was going to need a lot more educated talent. After all, much clever stuff needed to be done. As a result, the directive from on high was to build more universities and churn out more graduates.
With its focus on the churning, rather than the educating, the program was a runaway success. According to the New York Times, “In 1998, when Jiang Zemin, then the president, announced plans to bolster higher education, Chinese universities and colleges produced 830,000 graduates a year”. By 2010, the number had risen to six million. Last year, over eight million students in China graduated.
Yet, graduates come in many different flavours; back when they entered university, they chose a variety of majors, and then passed their exams in a variety of colours, some of them flying, others more… trudging.
Those who chose engineering, economics, IT and science majors, who also graduated with honours are the ones who have landed the top jobs. They have the golf club memberships and drive their family for flashy holidays in their even more flashy cars. The reason they can afford all this is that their long term earning potential also far outstrips many who chose a different field of study. The annual report, China Occupational Skills, reveals that within 3 years of graduating, the top 15 percent of such graduates earn double the average salary of others. They are the poster child for the modern dream of China’s youth.
They are also the antipathy of the ant tribe. Yet it is not a situation whereby there is widespread unemployment among Chinese youth. It is true that the graduate unemployment rate in China has remained relatively stable; only 8 percent of graduates are still unemployed 6 months after donning their mortar board. Nevertheless, 25 percent of graduates end up with a salary below that of a migrant worker, while many of the remainder work jobs that are low-skilled and do not require a degree. With a vast pool of graduates available to employers for filling such positions, there is no incentive to offer any more than the minimum wage.
Our ants are now pretty much running in circles, with career progressions that call into question the very value of their degree.
The other realty to be faced is many ants lack necessary skills which are unrelated to their field of study anyway. Research by the American management consulting and analytical giant, McKinsey, has revealed that there is a short supply of graduates with “soft skills” assets that include communication, analytical and managerial skills. Chinese companies complain of not being able to find the high-skilled graduates that they need, and end up “making do” by perhaps employing two ants instead of one queen bee.
It is this that lies at the crux of the ant conundrum. It is also this that has given rise to the ant tribe’s status within China’s social paradigm; a disadvantaged class that holds hands with peasants, migrant workers and the unemployed left behind by economic reform.
For the powers that be, the biggest worry is the ant tribe also possesses the most potential for creating social unrest, unhappy at their state of affairs, and seemingly impossible future. With six to a bed, they have plenty of time together to hatch cunning plots to bring about an undoing of the harmonious society that China works so hard to protect.
