Female college students looking for jobs at the 2024 Women's Campus job fair held in Huaibei, eastern China's Anhui province, on March 12, 2024.
Photo | Future Publishing | Getty Images
young people inside China Faced with an increasingly tough labor market, people are looking for help in the most unlikely of places when it comes to finding work. crater.
Jade Liang, a master's student in Shanghai, decided to delete her dating app account after unsuccessfully applying for more than 400 jobs online. While she used to use it to look for romance, she now finds it useful to connect with her fellow professionals for casual coffee chats.
„I just swiped right on people in the industry that I wanted to join,“ Liang, 26, told NBC News. He says his intentions become clear when he starts chatting with his opponents online, and the responses are generally: welcome.
Liang is one of many job seekers in China who are resorting to unconventional methods due to fierce competition and lack of job opportunities. Among unemployed adults, Working as a “full-time child” They perform housework and errands for their parents in exchange for financial assistance.
China, the world's second-largest economy after the United States, is struggling with youth unemployment, which reached a record 21.3% in June last year.rear Suspend publication of youth unemployment data It took several months to revise the calculation method, but in December Chinese authorities announced that the unemployment rate for 16-24 year olds, excluding students, was 14.9%.
This compares to the 8% unemployment rate for Americans ages 15 to 24 in the same month, according to the Federal Reserve.
Although high youth unemployment rates are not uncommon in countries like China, facing other economic challenges„China's problems seem to be getting more serious this time,“ said Su Yue, chief economist at the Economist Intelligence Unit in Shanghai.
„The country's economic downturn, the impact of the pandemic, and industrial consolidation all happened at the same time, and the impact on young people was even greater,“ she said.
Even in the face of this pressure, she says, „Even when I'm browsing dating apps, I can't help but feel a surge of excitement when I meet someone who works in the same industry.“ says Joy Geng, who just graduated from a British university. Currently based in Beijing.
“Saturated” market
Liang first thought of Tinder as a job-hunting tool after seeing a viral post on Xiaohongshu, China's equivalent of Instagram, by a user who had successfully used the Chinese dating app to find a job. It was when
Similar posts suggesting dating apps as a way to find work are common on Chinese social media.
„If a recruiter asks me how I know about openings, I'm on Tinder,“ read one widely shared meme last year.
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Tinder is one of many foreign apps blocked in mainland China, but residents can access it using a virtual private network.
„Using dating apps allows you to contact more people,“ Liang said. „It usually takes a long period of time to become intimate with people. But on dating apps, just spending a few hours with a stranger can already give up a ton of personal information.“
Geng said job seekers may also be turning to Tinder now that they can no longer access LinkedIn. This is because it was announced that LinkedIn is also blocked in China. withdraw from the country slated for 2021, frustrated by domestic alternatives.
Liang said that despite being able to access LinkedIn using a VPN, she tried Tinder because she felt like traditional job hunting methods were failing her.
„The market is oversaturated because of the economic downturn,“ she says.
Tinder itself discourages this practice, saying its platform is designed to foster personal relationships, not business relationships.
„Tinder is not a place to encourage companies to make money,“ a company spokesperson told NBC News in a statement.
![Economist says China's youth unemployment rate is shocking](https://image.cnbcfm.com/api/v1/image/107359952-17054597091705459705-32924678213-1080pnbcnews.jpg?v=1705459708&w=750&h=422&vtcrop=y)
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It has also drawn criticism from those seeking purely romantic connections, who say they can no longer trust other users' motives.
On Weibo, China's equivalent of X, there were comments such as „I can't believe that people use dating apps to look for jobs'' and „I can't believe the first thing a dating app user says.'' there were.
Romy Liu, who previously worked at an executive search firm in Hangzhou, China, said that from an employer's perspective, finding job opportunities through Tinder is a good sign that applicants have „strong social skills.“ Said it would suggest making a strong enough impression on someone. They just met to get introduced.
“I think it’s great for people to be able to get work through this type of platform,” she said.
However, she says this is less efficient than traditional job search methods and „may only be viable for international companies or internet giants.“
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And Liu cautioned that not all employers may view Tinder's approach so favorably.
„If a national company hears that you're looking for a job on Tinder, I think they might blacklist you forever,“ she says.
Zoe Zeng, who works in the finance industry in Paris, said that while the Tinder method is available to job seekers all over the world, several factors make it more effective in China, where it is primarily used by highly educated professionals. He said it was possible.
Tinder users in China are „already very selective as the majority of users were pursuing degrees abroad,“ Zeng said. „But in France, Tinder is known for finding sexual partners. 90% of the people I contacted wanted to find friends with benefits.“
„I don't think the purpose of this kind of software is still the same in China or abroad,“ said Zeng, who uses Tinder solely for networking.
She said that she found Tinder to be a useful professional tool in Paris as well, saying, „Even if it's not very efficient in my opinion, it allows me to network with people who exactly match my background. I can do it,” he said.
Liang is still looking for opportunities in China.
“Finding the ideal job is so difficult that it makes me want to give up a little bit,” she said. „However, if you actively use dating apps for job hunting, I think it will be of great help.“