How China s internet giants have failed the country s youth
Posted : 2021-02-28 13:42
Updated : 2021-02-28 16:54
Some Chinese entrepreneurs still believe success depends on long working hours and scrimping on employee benefits. South China Morning Post
2020 was not an easy year for Chinese tech companies: many came under scrutiny and received queries from market investors and government officials. Yet these internet giants difficulties hardly matched those faced by some of their employees.
The tragic deaths of white- and blue-collar tech workers alike triggered scathing questions on the labour conditions in some of China s most well-known tech behemoths.
Almost two years after the launch of 996 ICU , an online campaign protesting the overwork culture in China s Big Tech, the situation seems to have only got worse.
China’s youth rebel against ‘996’ work culture
By Helen Davidson / The Guardian, TAIPEI
On the Chinese microblogging platform Sina Weibo, enthusiastic slackers share their tips: Fill up a thermos with whiskey, do planks or stretches in the work pantry at regular intervals, drink liters of water to prompt lots of trips to the toilet on work time, and, once there, spend time on social media or playing games on your phone.
“Not working hard is everyone’s basic right,” one commenter wrote. “With or without legal protection, everyone has the right to not work hard.”
Young Chinese people are pushing back against an engrained culture of overwork, and embracing a philosophy of laziness known as “touching fish.”
Pinduoduo confirmed the deaths of two young workers recently, sparking debate over a culture of overworking in China’s tech companies. A ‘996’ work schedule of 12 hours a day, six days a week has become an unwritten standard for many of the country’s tech firms.
The dark side of working for China’s booming technology industry is under the spotlight again amid public criticism of social commerce giant Pinduoduo in the wake of two employee deaths, with many fearing the infamous 996 culture has become worse and not better due to pressure from the pandemic.
Pinduoduo, a rapidly expanding online sales firm, first found itself at the centre of a storm following the death of a 22-year-old woman surnamed Zhang, who was working at one of its new business units in Urumqi, on Dec 29 last year. Pinduoduo released a statement on Zhang’s death on Jan 4 and the same week, it said another young worker, surnamed Tan, jumped to his death in his hometown of Changsha.
Posted by Joseph Brouwer | Jan 12, 2021
A Pinduoduo employee’s suicide, the second work-related death at the company in as many weeks, and an Ele.me courier’s self-immolation have set the Chinese internet ablaze with discussion on labor conditions in the tech sector. Last week, a young Pinduoduo employee collapsed and died on the way home from the office, reportedly due to overwork. White-collar employees write that 996 culture the expectation that one is in the office from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m., six days a week drives employee deaths. Blue-collar delivery drivers face a different dilemma: delivery giants’ local subcontractors that sometimes refuse to pay drivers, even when they meet astronomically high, algorithmically determined delivery benchmarks. At The Washington Post, Lily Kuo and Lyric Li reported on