Aric Chen
@aricchen • 52,860 subscribers
Independent analysis on China, US-Asia & global affairs. Executive producer, senior editor & anchor. Foreign policy think tank mentor. Notes: @AricChenJournal
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🚨 Shocking video exposes a tiny spy camera hidden in a public toilet stall — red recording light glowing right in the floor grout. This is rampant across CCP China. Public restrooms, changing rooms… and especially hotels are packed with hidden cameras feeding a massive spycam porn black market. Always inspect every inch before using ANY facility. Your privacy is under constant threat. Stay vigilant! #HiddenCameras #ChinaSpyCams
Aric Chen4,299,110 просмотров • 2 месяцев назад
🚨💔 Heartbreaking tragedy unfolds in China again. On May 3, a female tourist named Liu died in a horrific accident at Maliuyan Adventure Park in Sichuan’s Huaying City. Strapped into the “Waterfall Swing” — a 168-meter-high ride over a roaring waterfall — she repeatedly screamed “It’s not tied tight!” twice as staff ignored her and pushed her off the platform. She plummeted, slammed into the cliff, and was pronounced dead on the way to hospital. This wasn’t bad luck. It was preventable negligence. Once more, China’s booming adventure tourism industry puts profit before people, cutting corners on safety checks, training, and basic equipment. How many more lives must be lost before authorities treat human safety as a priority instead of an afterthought? My deepest condolences to Liu’s family and friends. No one should ever have to beg for their life on a paid attraction — only to be ignored. Enough is enough. Safety cannot keep being sacrificed for tourism dollars. 💔 #ChinaSafetyCrisis #AdventureTourism #RestInPeace
Aric Chen2,057,907 просмотров • 2 месяцев назад
Rare: Japan Just Released Its First-Ever Video of China's Liaoning Carrier. Beijing's Story Collapses on Camera. For the first time on record, Japan's Ministry of Defense (MOD) has publicly released video footage of the People's Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) aircraft carrier CNS Liaoning under close Japanese surveillance in the Western Pacific. The Joint Staff Office of the Japan Self-Defense Forces (JSDF) posted the clip on July 3, breaking with decades of quiet monitoring practice. The footage documents Liaoning's activity in late May and June, when the carrier and its escorts transited the Miyako Strait, ran flight operations near Okinotorishima and Minamitorishima, and racked up over 170 fighter and helicopter sorties in just three days between May 26 and 28. Across the full 40-day deployment from May 19 to June 22, JSDF destroyers including JS Asahi, maritime patrol aircraft, and Air Self-Defense Force fighters shadowed the strike group. The Japanese cameras were rolling the whole time. Beijing tried to sell a very different story. State broadcaster China Central Television (CCTV) claimed the Liaoning had "warned off" Japanese warships and surveillance planes, and released its own edited footage framing Chinese professionalism against alleged Japanese provocation. The Chinese Ministry of National Defense (MND) called Japan's monitoring "outrageously audacious" and accused JSDF forces of running simulated attack drills against the carrier. That narrative required the audience to never see what Japan actually saw: the deck cycles, the launches, the escorts, the entire carrier group in Japanese crosshairs from the East China Sea through the Second Island Chain. Now Japan has put it on the table. The Joint Staff Office rarely releases moving imagery of foreign warships, and it explained the break in convention as an effort to help the public understand the daily reality of the JSDF's national defense mission. The message travels well past Japan. Every ally reading the file now has visual confirmation that Tokyo tracked Liaoning through the entire deployment, exactly during the period the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) propaganda apparatus was insisting Japan had been "warned off." That model of storytelling only works when the tape stays in the vault. Japan just released the tape. Note: The video below is my broadcast anchoring this story on air. ACI — Aric Chen | Insights
Aric Chen60,619 просмотров • 4 дней назад
🇯🇵Japanese Civility vs. the Erosion of Tradition: A Tale of Two Cultures! Japanese fans have long been admired worldwide for a simple yet profound act of responsibility. After soccer or baseball matches, they routinely stay behind to collect every piece of trash, wipe down seats, and leave stadiums cleaner than they found them. This is not a publicity stunt but a deeply ingrained cultural habit. From elementary school onward, Japanese children learn to clean their classrooms and shared spaces. Concepts like mottainai—a sense of regret over waste—and respect for public property shape daily life. The result is visible discipline: orderly queues, low litter, and a collective understanding that one’s actions affect the community. In 2026, as the World Cup unfolds, this tradition continues to earn global praise. It reflects a society that values self-reliance, harmony, and personal accountability over convenience. The contrast with many mainland Chinese and Chinese tourists is striking and frequently documented. In popular destinations in China and across Asia, Europe, and beyond, reports and videos often show groups leaving behind piles of food wrappers, plastic bottles, and discarded items in parks, beaches, and landmarks. While not every individual behaves this way, the pattern has become noticeable enough to prompt complaints from local authorities and other visitors. This behavior clashes sharply with Japan’s approach and raises uncomfortable questions about differing standards of public conduct. These differences are not rooted in ethnicity or inherent national character. Chinese civilization once emphasized Confucian principles of propriety (li 禮), harmony, and self-cultivation. Filial piety, respect for elders, and communal responsibility formed the moral foundation for centuries. However, under decades of CCP rule, these traditions faced systematic attack. The Cultural Revolution explicitly targeted the “Four Olds”—old ideas, culture, customs, and habits—destroying temples, burning books, and persecuting intellectuals and traditional practitioners. Subsequent policies prioritized class struggle, ideological conformity, and rapid material development over moral education. The result, observable in parts of mainland society today, includes weakened social trust, a focus on personal gain, and diminished regard for shared spaces. State propaganda and education have often emphasized collective loyalty to the Party rather than individual virtue or universal ethics. When people grow up without strong reinforcement of personal responsibility, public behavior can suffer. By comparison, overseas Chinese communities—in Taiwan, Singapore, Hong Kong’s earlier era, and diaspora populations worldwide—have largely preserved traditional values. Emphasis on education, family cohesion, hard work, and courteous conduct remains prominent. Many excel in business and academia precisely because these cultural strengths were not uprooted by the same ideological campaigns. Their reputation for civility and reliability often stands in positive contrast to reports from the mainland. Japan demonstrates what is possible when a culture actively nurtures discipline and respect across generations. Its success is not accidental but the product of consistent education and societal norms that survived modernization. China’s challenges with public conduct in some contexts stem less from the people themselves than from governance that disrupted the transmission of civilizational values. Restoring emphasis on traditional ethics—personal accountability, respect for others, and care for shared environments—could help bridge the gap, regardless of political system. The Japanese example offers a clear lesson: civilization is not inherited automatically. It must be taught, practiced, and protected. When ideology supplants tradition, the human cost appears in everyday manners and public spaces. When culture is preserved, the results speak for themselves through quiet acts like cleaning up after oneself. The choice between these paths remains one of the most important facing any society.
Aric Chen173,587 просмотров • 23 дней назад
Under the rule of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), the Chinese people are suffering immensely, with countless lives in despair. Millions are now homeless, sleeping rough on streets, under bridges, and in parks across major cities. Shockingly, recent estimates indicate that China’s homeless population has surged to around 24–50 million — a more than fivefold increase since 2020 — with over 60% being young people under the age of 33.5. These are not just the elderly or traditional vagrants, but a growing wave of young graduates, laid-off workers, and migrant laborers crushed by sky-high youth unemployment (still hovering near 17% officially, with real figures likely higher), stagnant wages, unaffordable urban housing, and a collapsing job market amid economic decline. While the CCP boasts of “prosperity” and “common prosperity,” reality tells a different story: young people who once dreamed of a better future are now forced to “lie flat,” deliver food on scooters, or huddle on sidewalks just to survive. The regime’s policies — from zero-COVID fallout to crackdowns on private enterprise and massive debt — have left an entire generation without hope or shelter. This is the true face of life under CCP rule: 民不聊生 (the people have no means to live). The propaganda cannot hide the human cost any longer. The world needs to see the suffering of China’s youth and the failure of authoritarian control. Share if you care about truth and human dignity. #ChinaHomelessCrisis #YouthDespair #CCPReality #RealChina #EndCCP
Aric Chen | Insights300,421 просмотров • 2 месяцев назад
Oh look, the mighty CCP issued a “stern warning” that Chinese ships would sail through the Strait of Hormuz no problem — “don’t you dare mess with us!” Fast forward: two Chinese oil tankers just got turned away like lost delivery boys, hiding behind fake flags from landlocked countries (Malawi and Botswana, because nothing says “global superpower” like pretending your tanker is from a nation with zero coastline). President Trump’s navy blockade is working, Iran’s oil revenue is choking, and Beijing is quietly seething while 40-50% of its oil supply gets rerouted or parked. “Rules-based international order” only applies when the rules favor the Communist Party, huh? Classic CCP: all bark, no strait. Check Jack Bradley’s report for the MarineTraffic receipts. The face-slap is glorious. #EndCCP #CCP #Hormuz
Aric Chen311,801 просмотров • 2 месяцев назад
🚨 Somewhere in Zhongnanhai tonight, Xi Jinping is staring at these videos. Lee Jae-myung — South Korea's center-left president, the one Beijing thought would tilt their way — hugging Takaichi at a hotel door in Andong. Sky-blue tie matched to her suit. Their 4th summit in 6 months. "Hometown shuttle diplomacy," now fully established. Zoom out: 🇺🇸 Trump called Tokyo from Air Force One 🇹🇼 Lai: "Taiwan will not be sacrificed" 🇵🇭 Marcos to Japanese media: PH "has no choice" on Taiwan 🇯🇵🇰🇷 Lee + Takaichi: locked in 🇷🇺 Putin: rushed to Beijing for photos 5 democracies. 5 capitals. 5 days. In perfect sequence. The encirclement isn't coming. It's here. And the man watching most nervously from Zhongnanhai knows it. Xi sees it. He can't stop it. 👇
Aric Chen152,051 просмотров • 1 месяц назад
🚨The HIMARS at the Foot of Fuji Was Not a Drill. It Was a Message. Three signals from three cities. One target. One 24-hour window. Beijing was always going to hear it. Just after 2 p.m. Tokyo time on Wednesday, a platoon of about fifty U.S. Marines from the 3rd Battalion, 12th Marine Regiment — Okinawa-based, ordinarily stationed within sight of the Taiwan Strait — rolled two HIMARS launchers onto the East Fuji Maneuver Area and fired two salvos. Six rockets. Pause. Six more. The launchers then did what they were built to do: pulled back from the firing line and disappeared. The Marines call this "shoot and scoot." In the age of cheap drones and counter-battery radar, it is no longer a clever tactic — it is the difference between a launcher that fights tomorrow and a launcher that is a smoking ruin within ninety seconds. The Pentagon framed the exercise in routine terms. Live-fire training. Readiness. Allied interoperability. "Reinforcing our commitment to regional security and the defense of Japan," the division spokesman wrote in his April briefing email. Many legacy media outlets reported it as a drill. Second consecutive year at this location. Nothing to see. That framing is technically correct and strategically blind. Because of what else happened on May 20. In Taipei, Lai Ching-te marked his second anniversary in office, halfway through his term, with a press conference reaffirming that Taiwan's future will not be decided by external forces and that arms procurement from the United States is essential to peace. In Washington, president Donald Trump walked onto the tarmac at Joint Base Andrews and told reporters he would speak with Lai personally — the first sitting U.S. president-to-sitting Taiwanese president call since the United States switched recognition to Beijing in 1979. And in Shizuoka Prefecture, on a maneuver area visible to local farmers and a 72-year-old former Japanese soldier watching from a hilltop in Gotemba, twelve American rockets arced into the foothills of Japan's most photographed mountain. Three events. Three cities. Same calendar day. You can call that coincidence if you want. The people who plan exercises eighteen months in advance, coordinate them with Japan's Ministry of Defense by formal email in April, and clear them with three different theater command headquarters do not believe in that kind of coincidence. Here is what the HIMARS at Fuji actually means in the wider picture. The system, as configured for Wednesday's drill, is short-range. But HIMARS is a platform, not a weapon. Swap the standard pod for the Precision Strike Missile and the same truck can put a warhead 500 kilometers downrange — from Yonaguni, from the Senkakus, from the Batanes islands the U.S. Army has been quietly deploying to since last year, that arc covers the Taiwan Strait and a meaningful portion of the southern Chinese coast. Beijing has spent two decades and several hundred billion dollars building an Anti-Access/Area Denial system designed around one assumption: that American power projection in the Western Pacific depends on a handful of large, fixed, exquisite platforms — carrier groups, Kadena, Guam. The DF-26 is called the "Guam Killer" for a reason. The entire bet is that if you can credibly threaten those platforms, the United States will not show up. A truck that fires twelve rockets and disappears into the tree line breaks that bet. There is no "Guam Killer" for a HIMARS battery that moves every forty minutes across an archipelago of forty-six inhabited islands the U.S. and Japan jointly operate. You cannot pre-target what you cannot find. This was the message Beijing received on Wednesday afternoon. Trump's announcement told them the political ceiling has been raised. Lai's anniversary speech told them Taipei is not negotiating its sovereignty. The rockets at Fuji told them the military floor has been raised too — and that the floor is mobile, distributed, and very difficult to break. The bell that has been ringing all week did not stop at the phone call. It rang again at 2 p.m. in the shadow of Mount Fuji. And the next time it rings, it may not be a training round. Original post by me Aric Chen. Views are my own — welcome to discuss!
Aric Chen109,283 просмотров • 1 месяц назад
China's labor market in 2026 presents Beijing with a problem it cannot solve through messaging, and the leadership's reliance on statistical concealment rather than structural reform suggests it already knows that. The headline numbers are bad enough on their own terms. Urban youth unemployment for those 16 to 24, excluding students, climbed to 16.9 percent in March, a four-month high that reversed six months of declines the state had pointed to as evidence of stabilization. The 25-to-29 cohort hit 7.7 percent, its highest reading since March 2025. Overall urban unemployment reached 5.4 percent, a 13-month peak. A record 12.7 million university graduates, roughly half a million more than the prior year, are entering this market, into an economy whose nominal growth has been depressed by a year of falling prices and whose private sector hiring appetite has shrunk in lockstep. The official figures, in any case, understate the condition of the labor market by design. China classifies anyone working one hour per week as employed; the United States uses fifteen hours, France twenty. Peking University economist Zhang Dandan calculated in 2023 that the true youth unemployment rate, once discouraged workers who had exited the labor force were counted, was as high as 46.5 percent, more than double the official figure at the time. Nothing in the structural picture since has plausibly improved that ratio. The drivers are not cyclical. Fixed asset investment grew only 1.7 percent in the first quarter, down from 4.2 percent a year earlier. The property sector, which at its peak accounted for roughly thirty percent of economic activity, remains in a multi-year contraction that has stranded construction workers and the supply chains built around them, and with them the cohort of migrant laborers in their forties and fifties who carry no pension, no portable benefits, and no obvious second act. The major platform companies, Alibaba, Tencent, ByteDance, JD, have spent years trimming headcount in the aftermath of the 2020 to 2022 regulatory campaign that left private capital feeling politically exposed. Deflation, now entrenched, completes the feedback loop: weaker pricing power compresses margins, hiring slows, household precautionary saving rises, demand softens further. Each link reinforces the next, and none is the kind of problem stimulus alone can resolve. The state's response has been instructive. When the youth unemployment rate hit a record 21.3 percent in June 2023, the National Bureau of Statistics suspended publication of the series entirely. When the figures returned months later, the methodology had been quietly revised, students excluded and age brackets adjusted, in ways that produced a lower headline and broke comparability with what came before. The pattern is consistent across other indicators: where the data embarrasses the leadership, the data is changed, delayed, or removed. This is not a communications strategy in any conventional sense. It is the substitute for one. Three things follow. First, the tang ping (躺平) or "lying flat" disposition that Beijing has spent years denouncing is a rational response to a labor market in which effort and credentials no longer reliably convert into stable employment or affordable housing, and the leadership's framing of it as a cultural failure rather than a market failure tells against any near-term policy correction. Second, the credibility cost of statistical opacity compounds. Foreign investors, domestic households, and even mid-level cadres are now operating without reliable employment data in the world's second-largest economy, which raises the risk of misallocated capital and miscalibrated policy at every level of decision-making. Third, the political economy is shifting in a direction the Party has not yet acknowledged. The cohort entering the workforce in 2026 has no memory of double-digit growth and no expectation of upward mobility. Whatever social contract underwrote the reform era is being renegotiated, quietly, by people who have stopped registering as unemployed because they have stopped expecting the system to find them work. Aric Chen | Insights
Aric Chen51,262 просмотров • 23 дней назад
💔🏙️ The daily reality for China’s migrant workers is brutal: overcrowded, unsafe dorms and miserable living conditions that no human should endure. This is the suffering Chinese people — the real China the Communist Party desperately tries to hide from the world. While the CCP constantly paints a picture of prosperity and the “Chinese Dream,” they are desperately whitewashing the truth. This is the real hardship of China’s working class. #RealChina #ChinaLabor #MigrantWorkers #CCPLies #China
Aric Chen | Insights122,929 просмотров • 1 месяц назад
This is the real China. In a Zhejiang, China classroom, a young girl suddenly fainted and collapsed to the floor. Nearly 20 classmates saw it happen — many kept drawing, none helped her or even alerted the teacher. The teacher remained unaware. In CCP China, “not my business” is the norm. Everyone fears getting into trouble, so society drowns in chilling indifference. This is the “harmonious” society they built. 😔 #China #CCPSociety #RealChina #EndCCP #CCP
Aric Chen144,168 просмотров • 2 месяцев назад
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⚠️ WARNING: This post contains references to graphic and violent footage. Viewer discretion is strongly advised. 🚨 A disturbing pattern in China that the world needs to know about. There’s a well-known saying circulating in China: “If you injure someone, you pay for life. If you kill them, you pay only once.” This isn’t just dark humor — it’s a legal and financial incentive to murder. Under China’s compensation system, hitting someone and leaving them permanently disabled can obligate the driver to lifelong financial support — potentially hundreds of thousands of yuan over decades. But a fatality? A one-time, capped payout. Done. The result? Horrifying viral dashcam videos of drivers — after accidentally hitting a pedestrian — reversing back over the victim. Again. And again. Not out of panic. Out of cold calculation. This isn’t a bug in the system. It’s a product of a broken legal structure where human life is literally worth less than a lifetime of medical bills. When a society’s laws make killing cheaper than maiming, you don’t have a traffic problem. You have a moral catastrophe. The CCP has had decades to fix this. The videos keep surfacing. The pattern keeps repeating. A government that cannot — or will not — protect its citizens from being murdered for financial convenience has forfeited its legitimacy. Say their names. Share the footage. The world must see this. 🌍 Original article by Aric Chen, views are my own. #China #HumanRights #CCP #Justice #CCPChina #RealChina
Aric Chen97,996 просмотров • 1 месяц назад
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🚨 Heartbreaking. Infuriating. This is the real China under the Chinese Communist Party. On April 29, 2026, in Tianmen City’s Yuekou Town, Hubei Province, an elderly woman suddenly collapsed and died while selling vegetables alone at a tiny roadside stall. Her entire inventory? Just a few bunches of greens and a basin of beans. She wasn’t retired. She wasn’t “cared for.” She was working until her last breath. This is what the CCP’s grand slogan — “the elderly are well provided for” — actually looks like in practice. A total, merciless lie. No real pension. No safety net. No dignity in old age. Just endless poverty and exhaustion for ordinary Chinese people while the Party elites preach “common prosperity” from their luxury compounds. The tragic lives of the common folk under Communist rule have once again exposed the regime’s propaganda for what it is: hollow, heartless, and fake. When even the elderly must die on the street to survive, the system has failed completely. #China #CCPLies #CCPChina #RealChina
Aric Chen | Insights113,384 просмотров • 2 месяцев назад
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🚨 Shocking video from Shanghai under CCP rule: A police officer violently grabs a woman holding her toddler and slams her to the pavement, causing the child to smash into the ground. This is how CCP “law enforcement” treats ordinary Chinese citizens — they don’t see them as human beings at all. In any other country, victims could sue for damages and compensation. The officer would face lawsuits, suspension, firing, or even arrest. But in China? Ordinary people have nowhere to complain. No justice, no accountability — the regime protects its enforcers, not its people. This exposes the CCP’s rotten systemic brutality. Only by ending the CCP can the Chinese people finally live and work in peace and contentment! #EndCCP #CCPBrutality #ChinaHumanRights #RealChina #China #CCPChina
Aric Chen | Insights107,899 просмотров • 2 месяцев назад
Despite all the CCP's loud propaganda and endless paid influencers whitewashing their image, this is the REAL China. Millions of ordinary Chinese people are still struggling on the edge of hunger and poverty—while the regime boasts about "prosperity" and "national rejuvenation." The hypocrisy is staggering. The oppression is heartbreaking. The world must see the truth: behind the shiny skyscrapers and staged parades, countless lives are crushed under the weight of authoritarian control. Stand with the suffering Chinese people. Expose the lies. End the delusion. End CCP. #RealChina #CCPHypocrisy #CCP #EndCCP
Aric Chen120,529 просмотров • 2 месяцев назад
🚨 The brutal truth behind China’s “economic miracle”: This is a typical Chinese factory dormitory where men and women are forced to live together in the same narrow, filthy room. Dozens of workers crammed into triple bunk beds stacked wall-to-wall, clothes hanging everywhere, zero privacy, and zero hygiene. This dehumanizing condition is the daily reality for millions of ordinary Chinese migrant laborers across the country — not the exception, but the norm. While the CCP constantly paints a picture of prosperity and the “Chinese Dream,” they are desperately whitewashing the truth. This is the real hardship of China’s working class. #RealChina #ChinaLabor #MigrantWorkers #CCPLies
Aric Chen | Insights95,455 просмотров • 2 месяцев назад
Several disabled people in China, just trying to make a living by singing on the streets, were brutally beaten by police enforcing the law. This has sparked massive public outrage! In communist China, ordinary citizens have absolutely no way to survive at all! 😡 #CommunistChina #HumanRightsAbuse #CCP #CCPChina #RealChina #China
Aric Chen74,819 просмотров • 2 месяцев назад
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🚨 BREAKING: Car Plows Into Crowd in Chongqing, China — 2 Dead, 6 Injured. But This Is Bigger Than One Incident. The Pattern China Doesn't Want You to See. Today (May 10, 2026), at approximately 1:40 PM local time, a car crash struck the Tanjia Bay intersection in Chongqing's Qianjiang district, where a 57-year-old woman surnamed He drove into pedestrians and other vehicles, killing 2 people and injuring 6. Eyewitness videos show adults and children knocked to the ground near what appears to be a school pickup area. Authorities say drink-driving has been ruled out, and the incident is being attributed to "improper operation." The case remains under investigation. But here's the question many Chinese citizens — and observers worldwide — are asking: Is this really just a traffic accident? The Pattern China Doesn't Want You to See This is not an isolated event. According to a BBC tally, police-recorded pedestrian or stranger attacks in China numbered just three to five annually between 2019 and 2023 — but that figure jumped to 19 in 2024. Fatalities rose from 3 in 2019 to 63 in 2024, while injuries spiked to 166. In April 2025, a woman drove her car into a crowd outside an elementary school in Jinhua, Zhejiang, killing multiple people and seriously injuring more than a dozen, including nine students. Authorities initially called it a "traffic accident" there too. These incidents follow a pattern described as "revenge against society" — people so consumed by anger, bitterness, or hopelessness that they strike random strangers instead of specific targets. The Deeper Crisis: A Society Under Pressure China's sluggish economy is denying its citizens the job opportunities they had been led to expect. Three-quarters of the roughly 7,000 protest incidents logged since 2022 were sparked by economic grievances such as unpaid wages, housing disputes, and the confiscation of rural land by local governments. The Chinese public cannot openly discuss these incidents or examine the underlying societal stressors. At the sites of these events, police and plainclothes officers remove flowers left by the public, disperse onlookers and foreign journalists, keep hospitalized victims away from reporters, and scrub online search engines of videos, eyewitness accounts, and trending hashtags. Rather than alleviating underlying social and economic pressures, the government's response has been to implement profiling systems targeting "high-risk" individuals — those without spouses, children, income, or assets — relying on identifying and managing perceived threats rather than addressing root causes. The Bottom Line As grievances accumulate and remain unaddressed, isolated acts of violence may become more frequent, evolving from aberrations into a grim pattern of societal dysfunction. Whether today's Chongqing incident was intentional or accidental, it is happening in a country where desperation is rising, outlets for grievance are closing, and the official response is more surveillance — not more justice. The world should be paying attention. Sources: Chongqing Public Security Bureau official notice; Foreign Policy; The Diplomat; Christian Science Monitor; Wikipedia. Original post by Aric Chen, views are my own.
Aric Chen53,654 просмотров • 1 месяц назад
🚨 China's unemployment crisis in 2026 — by the numbers, and by the faces behind them. The CCP calls it "seasonal fluctuation." The people living it call it despair. 📊 THE OFFICIAL NUMBERS — AND WHY THEY'RE WORSE THAN THEY LOOK In March 2026, China's official youth unemployment rate (ages 16–24, excluding students) rose to 16.9% — a 4-month high, reversing six consecutive months of decline. That's nearly 1 in 6 young people with no job. But here's the catch: China counts anyone who works even ONE hour per week as "employed." The US threshold is 15 hours. France is 20 hours. By any international standard, the real number is far higher. In fact, Peking University economist Zhang Dandan calculated that China's true youth unemployment rate in early 2023 was up to 46.5% — more than double the official figure. There is no reason to believe conditions have improved since. And it's not just the young: — Ages 25–29: 7.7% unemployed (highest since March 2025) — Ages 30–59: 4.3% unemployed (rising) — Overall urban unemployment: 5.4% — a 13-month high as of March 2026 This year, 12.7 million university graduates will enter the job market — 480,000 more than last year. A record high. Into an economy that is shrinking, not growing. 👤 THE FACES BEHIND THE NUMBERS These are not statistics. These are people. A young man sits on a curb in Sichuan, crying. "I genuinely have no money left. Not a single yuan." He has been looking for work for months. He is not in any government database as "unemployed" — because he gave up registering. A migrant worker in his 40s, who spent 20 years building China's cities, returns to his village. The construction site closed. The factory moved. The restaurant shut down. He has no pension. No safety net. Nothing. A fresh graduate, armed with a degree that cost her family years of savings, applies to hundreds of positions. She receives form rejections — or silence. She moves back home. Her parents tell her to "keep trying." She stops telling them how many rejections she has collected. A street vendor in Guangzhou sets up his stall at 6am. By noon, he has sold almost nothing. Foot traffic has collapsed. Everyone around him is cutting spending. He is, technically, "self-employed" — and therefore invisible in the unemployment statistics. 🏭 WHY IS THIS HAPPENING? The CCP's answer: seasonal factors. Global headwinds. Trade friction. The reality: 1. Fixed asset investment — the engine of China's growth for decades — grew only 1.7% in Q1 2026, down from 4.2% in Q1 2025. Investment is collapsing. 2. The property sector, which once drove nearly 30% of economic activity, remains in freefall. Construction has stopped on millions of homes. The workers who built them have nowhere to go. 3. China's major tech companies — Alibaba, Tencent, ByteDance, JD·com — have been cutting headcount for years, under government pressure that made private enterprise feel like a liability, not an asset. 4. Foreign companies are leaving or reducing exposure. The market that once promised unlimited growth now promises unpredictability. 5. Deflation has taken hold. When prices fall, businesses earn less. When businesses earn less, they hire less — or fire more. When people fear job loss, they spend less. The cycle feeds itself. The result: a generation of educated, capable, ambitious young Chinese people — doing nothing. Not because they won't work. Because there is no work. 🔇 WHAT THE CCP DOES INSTEAD OF SOLVING IT When youth unemployment hit a record 21.3% in June 2023, the government didn't fix it. They stopped publishing the data. For months, the numbers disappeared from official releases entirely. When they returned, the methodology had been changed — students were excluded, age brackets were redefined — making direct comparisons harder and the figures look cleaner. In May 2026, authorities began officially renaming homeless people "dispersed persons" (流散人员). Not to help them. To make them statistically disappear. This is the CCP's answer to suffering: rename it. Redefine it. Delete it from the dataset. 📉 THE COST OF "LYING FLAT" A generation of Chinese youth have embraced 躺平 (tǎng píng) — "lying flat." Not as laziness. As rational surrender. Why work 996 hours (9am to 9pm, 6 days a week) for a company that will downsize you anyway? Why compete for jobs that don't exist? Why take on a mortgage for an apartment in a building that may never be completed? The state tells them to be patriotic, to sacrifice, to trust the Party's vision. They've watched that vision fail them. So they lie flat. And the CCP — which created the conditions for this — blames them for lacking ambition. ——— The people in these videos are not failures. They are not lazy. They are not "seasonal fluctuations." They are the cost of a political system that prioritizes control over people, data management over truth, and the Party's image over the lives of 1.4 billion human beings. Share this. The numbers will be deleted again. The faces should not be forgotten. Sources: China National Bureau of Statistics (April 2026) · CNA (April 21, 2026) · World Journal (April 2026) · Peking University / Zhang Dandan (2023 analysis) · Epoch Times (April 21, 2026)· Original post by Aric Chen, views are my own. #ChinaUnemployment #YouthUnemployment #ChinaEconomy #躺平 #LyingFlat #CCP #HumanRightsChina #China2026 #China #RealChina
Aric Chen53,709 просмотров • 1 месяц назад