No more 'iron rice bowls'

Chinese examinees walk towards an exam site to attend the 2015 China National Civil Service Examination in Nanjing, East China's Jiangsu province, Nov 30, 2014. [Photo/IC]

Due to an increasing number of media reports about the resignation of civil servants, including some high-level ones, and the authorities' intensified efforts to make their incomes transparent, it has been suggested that being a public servant, which was once viewed as an "iron rice bowl", is now being looked at more rationally by job seekers.

The resignation of several bureau-level officials in Shanghai and Shandong province in the first half of this year sparked much discussion about the declining attractiveness of government jobs.

However, the enormous number of candidates for this year's national civil service exam is enough to testify that government jobs are still an alluring career choice for many.

According to figures from Zhonggong Education, an institute that monitors applicant numbers, more than 459,600 people had applied to take the exam by Tuesday, the sixth day of the application window, which is due to close on Saturday. And as the deadline approaches, the number of new applicants is expected to increase sharply.

Yet there is also an uneven distribution of applicants, with some positions receiving more applicants than others, and some even receiving none, which may be a result of applicants' ingrained perceptions about the income expectations offered by different jobs.

Clearly, much work is still to be done to assure job seekers that all government jobs have been put under a unified, transparent and systematized income system.

However, the fierce hunt for government jobs by a large number of people should not be used as an excuse for accusations that public servants enjoy gray incomes. After all, there has been an increasing number of government employees choosing to resign because of economic factors.

No matter whether there is increased or decreased enthusiasm among job seekers for government jobs it is no longer indicative of anything more than their choice is based on market motives.