China labor market tight, but wage increases low

China’s labor market remained tight in the first quarter as the economy roared back. Workers, however, are finding that pay hikes aren’t as generous as they used to be, according to Bloomberg. A slew of official and private indicators from recruitment fairs and websites show employment solid as factories stopped cutting payrolls amid surging industrial output. But services firms and new industries are no longer aggressively hiring, and wage gains for high-skilled professionals as well as less-trained migrant workers are moderating. China’s job market is increasingly intertwined with consumption, which has been bolstered by rising incomes: Private and government buying accounted for 77.2% of the first-quarter expansion.  The surveyed jobless rate fell below 5% in March, according to the National Bureau of Statistics. China created 3.34 million jobs in the first quarter, well on pace to exceed the government’s 11 million target for this year.