Committing to a Globalized Labor Market

As China’s economy continues to grow, an increasing number of overseas professionals are opting to work in the country. At the same time, China’s demand for international talent, ranging from language teachers to scientists, is also on the rise.

At the Third Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC) in July, where reform tasks of the country for the next five years were laid out, the decision was made to open China’s labor market wider to the outside world. This is undoubtedly welcoming news for foreigners seeking to land a job in China. Moreover, a raft of enhanced measures have been rolled out in recent years to make it easier for expats to obtain housing, access medical services and make payments within the country.

China has the largest labor force in the world and its working population is becoming better educated. The annual influx of college graduates, in particular, provides a boost to the quality of China’s workforce. In this context, further facilitating access to its labor market for overseas professionals illustrates China’s commitment to deepening reform and expanding opening up.

From the commodity market to the services, capital and labor markets, China is advancing opening up to the outside world in an orderly manner. To support this measured approach, the country is steadily enhancing institutional frameworks, aligning with high-standard international economic and trade rules, and harmonizing regulations in areas including property rights protection, industrial subsidies, environmental standards, labor protection, government procurement, e-commerce and the financial sector.

Expanding the opening up of the labor market serves as a valuable complement to China’s existing workforce. For instance, in fields such as foreign language education and international domestic services, native speakers are in great demand.

By broadening access to its labor market, China can attract high-caliber professionals from around the world, fostering international exchange and cooperation.

In the long run, doing so will help address shifts in the domestic labor market, especially workforce shortages. According to figures from the Development Research Center of the State Council, the country’s highest state administrative organ, by 2030 China’s working-age population is projected to decrease to 963 million from 989 million in 2020, and the labor force participation rate, which represents the percentage of the working-age population that is either employed or actively looking for work, is expected to fall from 68.44 percent in 2020 to 65.17 percent.

From the perspective of China’s development needs, the most urgent demand in the country’s labor market is that for high-end technical professionals from overseas. China’s modernization efforts, specifically the ongoing technology revolution, urgently require opening up the labor market to these high-end foreign professionals. This includes not only easing the procedures of obtaining work permits but also providing conveniences in housing, healthcare and travel.

In the context of globalization, opening up the labor market is a strategic response to challenges such as global labor mobility and population movement.

Since embarking on its journey of reform and opening up in 1978, China has been a major source of labor exports, with a considerable portion of the global workforce coming from China.

Now, as China broadens access to its labor market, it provides job opportunities for foreign workers, which in turn will stimulate domestic workers to hone their skills to compete in an increasingly competitive environment. This approach also promotes fair and inclusive growth within the international community.

Nevertheless, further opening up the labor market has also sparked controversy.

For example, China’s job market currently presents a challenging landscape, with many college graduates struggling to find employment. Under these circumstances, expanding access to the country’s labor market wider may worsen the situation.

It’s true that competition for lower-end jobs will intensify, but this will not slow down China’s efforts to further open up its labor market. Under economic globalization, competition in domestic and international markets is interconnected. A more internationalized labor market demonstrates a country’s global competitiveness in a positive way.