Why We Cannot Count the “Unemployed”

As of mid-2001, after six or seven years of massive bloodletting from the rolls of state-owned firms, one stark outcome is apparent. No one, and certainly not the central government, knows how many once-state workers have been removed from their posts. This article aims to characterize the chaos rampant in discussions of this programme, the human side of the dismantling of the state enterprise system, from a number of angles. My material leads me to argue that it is impossible to come to any kind of statistical judgment about China's current unemployment, particularly one drawing upon official statistics, which, because they are based upon extremely restrictive definitions, are fundamentally flawed. Government-generated data also throw into question any inferences about the plight of those moving in and out of the state of joblessness.