Confidence sky-high in soaring Shanghai

Opinion / Liang Hongfu

 Confidence sky-high in soaring Shanghai
By Liang Hongfu (China Daily)
Updated: 2005-12-02 05:54

One dreary winter evening in Shanghai, I had an opportunity to share a
taxi with a young executive of a joint venture company. Stuck in the
city's horrible traffic gridlock, we had plenty of time to talk about a
wide range of topics, ranging from the weather to family to work.

Her seemingly boundless confidence about her future reminded me of the
many young men and women I met in Hong Kong in the 1980s when the economy
there took off in earnest. She talked fast in mandarin, laced with
English words and phrases, and her manner was self-assured.

It made me wonder if we can see in her the soul of an entire generation
of Chinese, or just a member of an elite minority in the mainland's most
cosmopolitan city. I will let you be the judge.

With a journalism degree from one of the top universities in Shanghai,
she got a job at a local television station as a news reporter upon
graduation. After a few years there, she was given the city hall beat
supposedly in recognition of her seniority and capability. But that was
not what she wanted and she quit even before finding a new job.

"I just walked out because I knew that I could easily find a job," she
said. And that she did, within a couple of months.

High staff turnover rate is, of course, one characteristic of a booming
economy. The staff turnover rate at multinational companies on the
mainland is estimated to be as high as 17 per cent. As a result, staff
retention has become the priority in human resources management at many
foreign enterprises.

The loss of experienced staff is particularly troublesome to companies in
the services sector. The hotel industry is hit the hardest as many
international brands have embarked on ambitious expansion plans not only
in Beijing and Shanghai but also in many second tier cities. "The demand
for experienced staff in our industry far exceeds the supply," said
Anthony Leung, a senior vice-president of Jin Jiang International Hotel
Management Co, one of the largest hotel chains in China.

Throughout the 1980s and early 1990s, Hong Kong, with an unemployment
rate that seldom exceeded 2 per cent, enjoyed virtually full employment.
Job hopping was common among young workers as companies were raising
wages to attract not only managers, professionals and sales people, but
also secretarial and other support staff.

This seems to be happening in Shanghai and some other major mainland
cities and many social commentators have criticized young workers for
their fickleness in changing jobs.

To be sure, frequent job change is not good for one's career and,
perhaps, too many young workers switch from one job to another for
nothing more than a few hundred dollars increase in monthly pay. But
there are those, like this young woman in the taxi, who use the
opportunity to find a new career.

This freedom of choice for one's career has to be one of the most welcome
benefits arising from two decades of economic reform and market opening.
Such a choice tends to give young people the confidence to pursue an
ever-higher quality of life, just like my taxi partner.

She talked about buying a bigger apartment in a location closer to the
university where her husband taught. Although property prices in Shanghai
have remained high despite the latest correction, she said that if they
didn't buy now, prices would go even higher in the near future.

That sounded like what a young Hong Kong person would have said before
the outbreak of the Asian financial crisis in late 1997 which broke the
back of the property market there. These home-buyers were not responsible
for creating the property bubble. They were the victims of excessive
speculation when the bubble burst.

Taking a lesson from Hong Kong, Shanghai, perhaps, should try to help
these young people to buy homes with government guaranteed loans at
favourable interest rates.

This could be an effective way of attracting more young people to come to
live and work in Shanghai, where the need for new talent will remain high
as the city develops into a world-class services centre.

Email: jamesleung@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily 12/02/2005 page4)

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