Scammers prey on young Chinese desperate for jobs in bleak economy

Beijing: A Chinese mother went on television to seek justice for her 19-year-old intellectually disabled son after scammers tricked the desperate jobseeker into having breast augmentation surgery, in an incident that has sparked widespread outrage.

The teenager hoping for a job at a cosmetic surgery clinic in the central city of Wuhan was told the procedure would help him earn money, by winning followers through livestreaming.

The clinic even convinced him to borrow 30,000 yuan ($4,180) to pay for the surgery, his mother told a television station last week.

"For the sake of money, one can give up one's humanity," said one of more than 2,600 comments on China's Weibo social media platform where posts on the boy's plight have drawn more than 27 million views.

"Worse than beasts!" said another.

The mother managed to get the loan cancelled, with the help of the TV station and lawyers, but the breast surgery had already been done.

Scams such as recruitment for non-existent jobs, false advertising and loan traps are growing in China as the economy falters, with the top legal prosecuting agency saying last year that crooks were targeting more students and fresh graduates.

A record 11.79 million students graduated this summer, as the world's second-largest economy grapples with one crisis after another, from a trade war and the aftermath of Covid-19 to a prolonged property crisis and cautious consumer spending.

A job crisis among the young could test the economic leadership of the ruling Communist Party, which has repeatedly urged people to "listen to the party".

Finding jobs for young people is a top priority, President Xi Jinping said this year, as he expressed concern about their employment prospects.

False promises

Youth unemployment hit a record high of 21.3 per cent in June last year, prompting China to halt publication of the closely watched benchmark, saying students still enrolled should be excluded.

There is no way to track all job seekers among those aged 16 to 24, but a spokesperson for the National Bureau of Statistics said last year that 33 million of them were seeking employment.

"The pressure on employment still exists," Liu Aihua, a spokesperson for the statistics bureau, told a press conference on Thursday, after data showed China's overall jobless rate rose to a four-month high in July.

"Key groups still face pressure (in finding work)."

In another scam that made headlines last month, a college student seeking a part-time job in food delivery was persuaded to sign a year-long contract to rent an electric bicycle.

A staffer at a bike rental shop who pretended to be a recruiter for popular food delivery service Meituan told the student that he had to rent a bike before starting the job.

A few weeks later, the student realised his earnings were far below the "tens of thousands" promised by the "recruiter" and he was barely able to scrape together the monthly rental.

"It's hard enough to find a job, and now we need to be careful about scams too," said one Weibo poster.

Authorities say the darkening outlook for jobs has prompted some students to become scammers themselves.

The first 10 months of 2023 saw an annual rise of 68 per cent in the number of those younger than 18 who were prosecuted for phone and internet scams, the prosecuting agency said last November.

The incidents of young graduates with advanced college degrees joining scam syndicates also increased, it added in a report.

The Wuhan teenager's trauma was worsened by having to go under the knife a second time to remove the breast implants, his mother said on television.

"It pains me to see the two scars under my son's chest," she added. ($1=7.1735 Chinese yuan renminbi)