China's youth unemployment crisis spurs trend called 'full-time children'. Here's all you need to know

In China, a new trend called "full-time children" is making the headlines. What it means is that full-grown individuals get paid a salary by their parents to be their children "full-time". They hang out with their parents, take them out shopping, help around the house etc.

While getting paid to spend time with your loved ones does sound like the perfectjob, the reason for this so-called "job" cropping up is anything but heart-warming. Here's all you need to know.

The rise of #FullTimeChildren

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Almost three years of pandemic restrictions and rapidly increasing unemployment are the catalysts behind "full-time children".

In China, youth unemployment has become a serious challenge for the nation's economy,battered by its stringent "zero-Covid" restrictions.

As per a National Bureau of Statistics report released on Monday, in June, the nation's youth unemployment rate —people between ages 16 and 24 — reached a record high of 21.3 per cent.

NBC News reports that some full-time children "fall into" the job inadvertently as they look for jobs or pursue higher degrees.

How society views the "full-time children"

While hashtags #FullTimeDaughter and #FullTimeSon have been trending in China, the Chinese society most often than not accuses these individuals of mooching off of their parents and "chewing the old".

This Chinese slang term is a derogatory phrase for young people who are fully dependent on their parents to make a living.

Some parents see the trend of "full-time children" as a "blessing," while others view it as a temporary "phase" and believe it cannot be a permanent arrangement.

A worrying trend

Talking to NBC, Mao Xuxin, principal economist at the National Institute of Economic and Social Research in Britain said that the trend was "worrying".

He said that in recent years, young people in China had started looking for less challenging, short-term jobs. This he said was followed by what he called the "lying flat" movement, where people would do the bare minimum, or just enough to get by. Now, Mao said it has escalated to people taking the next step and asking for their parent's help.

As per Lu Xi, an assistant professor at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore, the wave of unemployment in China "may have just begun."

"In the absence of additional job creation, the phenomenon of 'full-time children' will be exacerbated, creating a vicious cycle," said Lu.

"The average disposable income of households will be reduced, resulting in a decline in overall social consumption, which in turn limits the social capacity to create new jobs, creating more unemployment, and thus, more full-time children," he predicts.

(With inputs from agencies)

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