Chinese unemployment

This year alone, more than 6m new graduates are knocking at the doorTHE lecture theatre at the Beijing Institute of Technology is full to overflowing, obliging unfortunate latecomers to hover by the nearby lavatories. Graduation is three months away and students are desperate to compete for the posts on offer at a job fair. After listening to introductory speeches they surge to place their CVs next to company nametags. One rapidly growing pile is for a telemarketing job paying less than a third of the citys average wage. The aspirants are software engineers.The global financial crisis could hardly have struck Chinas university campuses at a worse time. Even before economic growth began slowing last year, graduates had been having a tough time getting jobs thanks to a surge in college enrolment. This year 6.1m students will graduate from Chinese universities, nearly six times as many as in 2000. Next year the figure is expected to rise to about 7m. In 2011 it will reach a peak of nearly 7.6m according to Beijing Evening News, a state-owned newspaper. ...