Job worries? How does China compare to the U.S. and other countries?

• An Oliver Wyman survey found that 32% of people in China and 30% of people in Brazil were worried about how inflation would affect their job security.
• The report said that’s a lot more than the number of people in the U.S. and U.K. who said they were worried about their jobs.
• But when it came to the future of the economy, people in the UK were the most pessimistic, with 75% expecting things to get worse, the report said. People in China and Brazil were the most optimistic.

 

A survey done by the consulting firm Oliver Wyman and released this month found that more people in China and Brazil worry about their jobs than in the U.S. and U.K.

The report said that 32% of respondents in China and 30% in Brazil were worried about how inflation would affect their job security.

The survey found that this number was only 13% in the U.S. and U.K.

An official survey for July found that the number of unemployed young people in China between the ages of 16 and 24 has risen to nearly 20%, while the number of unemployed people in cities between the ages of 16 and 64 is about 5.4%.

As of July, official data showed that 9.1% of people in Brazil were out of work.

In July, the unemployment rate in the U.S. was much lower at 3.5%, while in the U.K., it was 3.6%.

The Oliver Wyman study looked at how people think inflation affects them. But Ben Simpfendorfer, a partner based in Hong Kong, said that the survey results may have been affected by things other than inflation that are unique to each country.

He said that Brazil has “periods of very high inflation” and that there are often bigger differences in income.

This was shown by the fact that a lot of Brazilians (68%) were worried about being able to pay for groceries and other necessities.

In all four countries, people were most worried about being able to pay for these goods, but Brazil came in first. The U.K. was second with 48%, then the U.S. with 44%, and China with 42%.

China has worries about jobs and money.

In the U.S., where job growth and wage growth have been strong despite fears of a recession, Simpfendorfer said that people would be most worried about being able to pay for groceries because of inflation.

“In China, on the other hand, growth has been a little slower, job growth for some groups has been slower, tech workers have been having a hard time lately, and wage growth has been slow,” he said. “That could also be a reason to worry about being able to buy groceries.”

Covid controls and a drop in the value of homes have hurt China’s economy. Tighter regulations, especially when it comes to tech companies on the internet, have also made people less happy.

The rate of price increases in China is also slower than the rate of growth in incomes.

According to official data from the first half of the year, the average amount of money Chinese city dwellers could spend each month was 4,167 Chinese yuan ($598). That was only 1.9% more than the same time last year.

In contrast, China’s consumer price index rose by 2.5% from a year ago to August. This was just a little less than the 2.7% rise seen in July, which was a two-year high. A big part of the rise was because the price of pork, which is an important food, went up.

The Oliver Wyman report said that the U.K. respondents were the most pessimistic about the economy, with 75% expecting things to get worse. This number was 56% in the United States.

The people from China and Brazil were the most optimistic, with 42% and 26%, respectively, saying they thought things would get better in the next six months.

But less than 15% of people in the U.S. or U.K. said that worries about a recession made them want to learn new skills or get a side job. But in Brazil and China, that share was well over 30%.