When Tang Peng met his ex-classmates at a recent party, he found
most of them had changed their jobs in the past few years. Only a
few of the more than 30 people were still in their original jobs,
and some had even changed five or six times.
"I
was shocked by the drastic change of people's careers," said Tang,
who has been serving in the General Office of Shaanxi provincial
government since graduating from college 16 years ago.
A
similar experience happened to Hai Feng, who found he was the only
one in his class who had not changed jobs since his graduation four
years ago.
"I
was informed from time to time by my ex-classmates of their new
addresses and numbers," said Hai, a media employee in Xi'an who
graduated from the economic department of Beijing University.
Like Tang and Hai, more people have a wider choice of jobs in
today's China, which enables them to re-define and achieve their
ambitions.
However, such freedom was not available to the elder generation,
who were given one job by the government upon graduation and
remained in it all their lives.
"In my days, people kept one lifelong job, regardless of whether
they were satisfied with it, unlike the young nowadays," said Hai
Feng's father, who retired from the same factory where he began his
working career.
In
the past, job changes were strictly controlled through residence
registration. Most of the time, each Chinese had only one job in a
system known as the "iron rice bowl."
Moreover, parents often handed over their positions to children to
keep a "good and stable job." As a result, many Chinese people took
jobs they didn't like or were not good at, and often remained so
for life.
However, since China began the gradual transition to a socialist
market economy in the 1980s, the government has been reforming the
residence registration system. More people, especially the
talented, found jobs that suited them. To change jobs has thus
become easier and more frequent.
Zhang Kejun, a Xi'an resident who began working in the early 1980s,
was first a cadre in the local branch of the Communist Youth
League, and then on the staff of a local newspaper.
After working as a journalist, a liaison officer for a Hong
Kong-based media firm and a freelancer, Zhang now works as deputy
manager of a state-owned enterprise in Beijing.
However, it was only in the 1990s that changing jobs became
commonplace.
In
today's China, the iron rice bowls are disappearing as China
reforms government branches as well as the personnel management of
enterprises.
Lifelong jobs are being replaced by employment contracts, and
college graduates are choosing jobs independently.
(eastday.com March 25, 2003)