Millions of university graduates registered for the 2007 National Examination for Civil Servants attracted by handsome housing subsidies, medical allowances and stable working conditions typically offered by government positions. Only two days after applications were opened to the public on October 14, the registration website broke down due to the high volume of traffic.

According to the Ministry of Personnel, there are 12,000 vacancies in 89 central government institutions this year. When online applications closed on October 24, more than 60,000 candidates had applied for two posts in the personnel department of the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television (SARFT). But official statistics on the total number of applicants have not yet been released.

Introduced in 1994 as one of the measures adopted by the central government to improve administrative reform, the national examination for civil servants has always been popular. In 2004, a total of 780,000 applicants competed for 8,000 positions, and in 2005, about one million applicants applied for 10,000 positions.

"The enthusiasm for civil service careers reflects the cut-throat competition in China's tight job market," said Xue Huifang, deputy director of the Department of Public Administration Research of the Chinese Academy of Personnel Science.

A report by the National Development and Reform Commission on April 27 showed that China faces serious challenges this year because three out of five university graduates are expected to join the ranks of the unemployed. Graduate numbers will increase by 22 percent this year to reach 4.13 million but the job market can only take on 1.66 million new graduates. Many of those who graduated in 2005 are still looking for work.

"It is hard to create new jobs in large numbers because of surplus production capacity, trade frictions and the revaluation of the yuan. As a result, it is not going to be easy to deal with employment pressures", said Zhang Xiaojian, Vice Minister of Labor and Social Security.

Based on the principles of "transparency, fairness, competition and merit", the examination system for civil servants "has been successful in providing a good opportunity for university graduates regardless of their household registration and family background," said Zhang Bailin, Minister of Personnel.

The hugely popular SARFT post sets no special conditions concerning the applicant's university major, political background, household registration or previous working experience.

A large pool of candidates is certainly good news for recruiters. "It is encouraging to see that some of the nation's most promising young talents want to make a career in government offices. This will enhance the overall quality of China's civil servants and improve government efficiency," said Zhang.

However, a public service vocation does not seem to be the main reason for the current popularity of government jobs, according to a survey conducted by China Youth Daily and Tengxun.com of 17,330 job applicants.

The survey revealed that 83.3 percent of candidates listed handsome housing subsidies, medical benefits and stable working conditions as key attractions of a civil service career. Another 55.8 percent confessed that they hoped to gain fringe benefits from government jobs.

"I was told by my schoolmate that his boss, who is a senior official in a central government institution, drives an Audi sedan provided by the government," said Allan Zhang, 28, who is preparing for the examination on November 25.

"Although the salary for his grade is only 1,700 yuan (US$213), he gets a 1,200 yuan (US$125) mobile phone allowance, and another 2,600 yuan (US$325) in housing subsidies every month. As for 'gray income' like gifts and coupons, you just name it," Zhang said. He quit his job as a software engineer in a Beijing-based multinational company last year.

He said that government officials have a lot of power. "When you become a senior official, you no longer need to carefully observe others' faces. Everything becomes easy because others can take care of it for you," he said.

Consequently, power-base institutions are the most popular with examinees. More than 5,000 applied for the five positions in the General Office of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC). By contrast, government recruiters in areas like meteorology, seismology and cartography have failed to attract enough candidates. Some posts in grassroots units or departments in remote areas like western Gansu Province and Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region also received scant attention from applicants.

"Everyone has the right to pursue benefits, but it is sad to see so many young talents acting cynically in a demanding job market, flocking to government offices to escape the insecurities of life," said Liu Xirui, professor at the National School of Administration.

"What is even more worrying is that these potential future decision makers can scarcely be said to have a clear concept of public service or healthy motives for civil servant positions," he said.

He noted that the responsibility of government officials is to serve the people instead of being served by the people. The government should be organized for the people and government officials should exercise power on behalf of the people.

"A high quality civil servant must have a broad vision, a good understanding of state policies, and a desire to serve the people, especially disadvantaged groups," Liu said. "The greater the power, the greater the responsibility."

Professor Yu An from the School of Public Administration of Tsinghua University believes that students' ideas about civil servants reflect their experience.

"Within the government, there is a disparity between the power that officials have and the responsibilities they have to shoulder," he said, adding that there is a lack of effective supervision of the power wielded by officials.

An annual report by the National Audit Office shows that government departments lost 2.2 billion yuan (US$275 million) in 2005 through corruption, inefficient taxation collection and bad land management. About 685 million yuan (US$86 million) was lost to embezzlers who fabricated expenditure or concealed and absconded with revenues. Lax tax collection, a euphemism for turning a blind eye to taxes owed in return for under-the-table favors, cost the government another 830 million yuan (US$104 million).

Yu said the "fever" for government positions also indicates, to some extent, a lack of trust in the stability of the social welfare system. Almost 90 percent of the rural population has no health insurance and nearly 60 percent of city dwellers are not covered by health insurance, according to the Ministry of Health.

"Social security is a key factor in social harmony," Yu added.

Last Wednesday, China published the Resolution on Major Issues Regarding the Building of a Harmonious Socialist Society, which was adopted at the conclusion of the Sixth Plenary Session of the 16th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC) on October 11.

"We are stepping up efforts to improve the rule of law, develop a culture of clean and honest government, and strengthen the checks and supervision on power," said Chinese President Hu Jintao.

He exhorted government officials "to improve their self-discipline and resist materialism, hedonism and individualism."

The recent dismissal of the former secretary of the Shanghai Municipal Committee of the Communist Party of China as well as Qiu Xiaohua, former head of China's National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), for their involvement in the 10 billion yuan (US$1.25 billion) social security fund scandal, illustrates the determination of central government to stamp out corruption and build a clean and efficient government.

China punished 67,505 government officials for corruption from January 2003 to August 2006, according to the latest judicial figures released on October 23. According to the procuratorate's statistics, more than 17,505 corrupt officials were prosecuted and punished in the first eight months of this year.

"University students should realize that a government job can never be a 'golden bowl'. The 'bowl' is given by the people and will be broken if responsibility is ignored," Liu Xirui stressed.

(China Features October 30, 2006)