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China is famousYour browser does not support the element., even infamous, for hard graft. Prodigious amounts of toil and elbow grease helped the country become the workshop of the world. More than 175m migrant workers labour in cities far from home, often leaving their children in the care of relatives. And the sacrifices are not confined to the poor. Even some of China’s more sophisticated firms are known for their “996” office culture, encouraging unfortunate employees to work from 9am to 9pm, six days a week.Many Chinese people therefore reacted with surprise and no little scorn to a new official survey of how they spend their time. The study, only the third of its kind, claimed that the average resident devotes less than three and a half hours a day to paid labour. “They must have surveyed government workers only,” quipped one on social media. “Did they go to kindergartens and care homes?” asked another.Many official statistics in China invite scepticism or even ridicule because they appear to unduly flatter the government. However, this result would appear to do the opposite. China’s leaders would like citizens to remain industrious and diligent even as the country advances. Indeed, they worry that prosperity will induce decadence and indolence. Many younger Chinese have, for example, rebelled against the rat races of professional employment and decided instead to “lie flat”, resigning themselves to low-key, bit-part jobs that at least offer a less stressful life. Is this phenomenon now showing up in the national statistics? Does the survey show that China is beginning to slack off?The survey was certainly thorough. China’s National Bureau of Statistics got in touch with more than 100,000 people, asking them to record what they were doing at 15-minute intervals, both on a weekday and at the weekend. But this introduces the first complication. One reason why China’s daily workload appears surprisingly light is because the hours are averaged across all seven days of the week. If someone works a regular eight-hour shift and enjoys a two-day weekend, their paid labour averages less than six hours a day in the survey. Even a slavish 996er would log not 12 hours a day, but ten hours, 17 minutes, once their solitary day off was taken into account.Although online critics were wrong to suggest the survey extended to children in kindergarten, they were not that wrong. The survey encompasses children as young as six, as well as the retired. That is another reason why the headline average appeared low: it was dragged down by people not in the labour market at all. When the young and the old are excluded, China’s work hours still look onerous by international standards (see chart). Working weeks tend to shorten as countries get richer, but China’s hours are longer than you might expect given its level of economic development. Excluding non-workers, Chinese people aged between 18 and 59 logged six hours and 32 minutes a day on average, an amount that produces an average working week of over 45 hours.On top of paid work, of course, is the unpaid kind. The survey shows that more than four in five women and two in three men carried out child care, housework, shopping or some other form of unremunerated labour. The women put in almost three and a half hours on average; the men did only half as much. The gender split was even worse than in the last survey in 2018, when men did 60% as much as women.The survey does not therefore reveal China to have transformed into a nation of slackers. At the same time, its people do genuinely seem to be working a little less intensely than they were last time they were surveyed. All told, they are spending nine fewer minutes on housework, and 23 minutes less on caring for other family members. They also sleep for 27 extra minutes on average. But the biggest change in their daily habits is not lying flat but logging on. Chinese people spend five hours and 37 minutes a day surfing the internet, up by almost three hours since 2018.Apart from extra minutes in bed and online, Chinese people have also increased the time devoted to less sedentary and perhaps more worthwhile activities. Almost half of Chinese residents now take part in sports and exercise, compared with less than one-third in 2018. Maybe the country’s exacting leaders need not fear: when the Chinese people are not working hard, more of them are working out.
