According to data recently released by the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security, in 2023, 12.44 million new jobs will be created in cities and towns across the country, the employment of young people such as college graduates will be basically stable and continue to improve, the scale of rural labor going out to work will continue to increase, and the scale of poverty alleviation will reach 33.97 million.
Employment is the greatest livelihood of the people and the most basic support for economic and social development. China attaches great importance to employment work, thoroughly implements the strategy of giving priority to employment, and does everything possible to stabilize employment. Since 2020, under the increasing uncertainties of economic operation, China still adds more than 11 million new urban jobs every year. Statistics show that from 2020 to 2022, the number of new urban jobs will be 11.86 million, 12.69 million and 12.06 million respectively. It should be said that stabilizing employment has contributed a positive force to stabilizing growth.
However, it should also be noted that the current pressure on total employment is still relatively large, and the structural employment contradiction of "difficulty in recruitment" and "difficulty in employment" is still prominent. On the supply side, China's total labor supply remains at a high level. The number of ordinary college graduates in the country in 2024 is expected to reach 11.79 million, an increase of 210,000 year-on-year. This figure, combined with the previous unemployed ordinary college graduates, as well as key groups such as migrant workers and people with employment difficulties, the total labor supply is still very large. On the demand side, industrial upgrading in the context of efficiency priority has made enterprises pay more attention to adopting new technologies to save labor costs. In particular, the widespread penetration of digitalization and intelligence has put forward higher requirements for the quality of the workforce.
From the perspective of healthy macroeconomic operation, the above two aspects are actually not problems, but the advantages of economic development. The abundant supply of labor shows that China continues to maintain the advantage of total human resources while continuously improving the quality of the population. Industrial upgrading and the extensive application of new technologies show that the economic structure is being adjusted in a better and better direction, and the quality of economic development is constantly improving.
However, when it comes to the job market, the large total supply of labor and the continuous upgrading of industries also make labor employment face the problem of imbalance in the structure of supply and demand. In general, the improvement of labor quality and technological change do not keep pace, and the former tends to lag behind the latter. With the acceleration of technological change, the imbalance in the structure of the job market is becoming more and more obvious. Therefore, the key to solving the current employment problem lies in optimizing the structure of the employment market.
To this end, it is necessary to focus on promoting industry-driven employment, pay close attention to the improvement of the quality of workers, closely follow the labor needs of different industries, do a good job in vocational skills training, fully mobilize the enthusiasm of universities, enterprises and social training institutions, build a diversified supply mode of vocational skills training, shorten the time lag between the improvement of labor quality and technological change, and let more workers adapt to the needs of industrial upgrading as soon as possible. At the same time, it is necessary to vigorously develop the life service industry, and effectively absorb more labor force by providing a variety of jobs, so that workers with different skills can find a stage suitable for themselves.
People are the most active factor in productivity. Any factor of production needs to rely on people as a carrier to play its role. To solve the problem of employment, it is necessary to provide a platform for people to exert their subjective initiative, motivate people to participate in labor and create wealth. As long as we continue to implement the employment priority strategy, focus on promoting industry-driven employment, actively adapt to the direction of industrial upgrading, and continuously optimize the structure of labor supply and demand, we will be able to continue to maintain a stable employment situation and provide solid support for high-quality economic and social development. (China Economic Net columnist Qiao Ruiqing).
The Commentary Theory Channel of China Economic Net is open for submission, and original comments and chapters can be sent to CEPL CEcn( changed to @). For details, please refer to the call for papers on the Economic **-China Economic Net Commentary Theory Channel.
For more information or cooperation, please pay attention to the official WeChat of China Economic Net (name: China Economic Net, ID: ourcecn).
*: China Economic Net.
For more content or cooperation, please pay attention to the official WeChat of China Economic Net (ID: ourcecn).