Ganbei: Graduate Refuge

With the coronavirus pandemic cutting swathes through job prospects around the world, refuge can be found in an "Irish snug" very far from Dublin.

Photo from Shutterstock.

It is 2018 in Paddy’s Irish Pub, opposite the Australian embassy on Dongzhimen Way, Beijing. Two Cambridge, one UCL and a Warwick graduate are meeting for a Guinness and a moan. In the background, a Russian and an American are doing a stand-up bit (in English) about the dangers of protest in Putin’s federation. At least, the punchline comes, there are protests in Moscow. This is the Northern Capital’s premier hangout for the “jaded foreign teacher” - a Beijing special - replete with full English breakfasts, a curry house upstairs and all the lad atmosphere an overqualified delivery driver for the ABCs could ever pine after.

In Beijing, work can be picked up like pennies from the pavement if you look foreign and understand English beyond “he, she and it”. Picked up, some of these pennies buy you first class tickets to bespoke classrooms, interested pupils and reasonable rewards. If you really plug away in your plush carriage, it can often get even better. Folks have been known to get their rent covered, extended holidays, fatter stacks of cash to fritter away on quiz nights, etc. There are other pennies, however, that lead you to “1-2-1 English” in Sanyuanqiao. Opposite the babywear and just along from the cinema playing exclusive 2002 digi-cartoons, 1-2-1 is the “Education department” of the Qimeng “kid’s mall”. Its client base is between two and five years old, its faculty comprise a gang of ex-drug dealers from Wolverhampton and its only reason for existence is the magic money pipe of “English education”. Walking along its lino halls after closing time, you might wander past “Ez V” (the teaching staff’s South African contingent) wheeling back and forth on a push car, tempting university students from outside Beijing to move there as part of his real estate scam. If questioned, he will flash a gold-tooth grin in your general direction. 1-2-1 is the antithesis of education. It is here the Cambridge graduate works.

‘My f****** boss…’ she begins. Grumbles and sips of Guinness fly around the table like a Mexican wave.

‘My f****** curriculum!’

‘Damn right! F*** ‘em!’

‘F*** ‘em!’

These are the cries of the underpaid and overqualified. Beijing is a spider’s web for the university graduate flying about jobless and confused. From all across the world they pour in - wings beating and diplomas clutched to their chests. The performing arts students, the history kids, the English majors. All proffer the middle classes’ favourite excuse for wasting time: they are here to learn about themselves and the world. In reality, they are here for the money and consistent employment. Salaries can be generous in a world of cheap food, cheap beer and endless cigarettes. Often teachers from “desirable” countries like the UK and the U.S. can expect to make twice the monthly salary of a local post-grad.

The sheer prevalence of diploma-wielding foreign jobseekers throughout China speaks to a great crisis in the value of degrees across the globe. As western economies have transitioned with ever more finality into the service sector, young people are left without the liberty to choose apprenticeships or other traditional career access paths. So, funneled into university, students spend years and a small fortune earning degrees often entirely unrelated to any field beyond academia. On graduation, professional employment eludes many - especially humanities graduates. According to Destination of Leavers from Higher Education data for 2016-17, only 63.7 per cent of humanities students were in employment six months after graduation while 19.2 per cent of English and 18.5 per cent of History graduates with jobs were working as retail, catering, waiting and bar staff. In this sense, official figures for graduate employment on university websites can be misleading. UCL History present two figures: 94 per cent for undergraduate employment and 82.2 per cent for students in graduate-level work or study within six months. The contraction of the latter figure into one number comprising both work and study reduces information transparency and (whether intentionally or not) may create false or inflated expectations in the mind of a prospective student. Though an overwhelming majority of new jobs expected to appear in the coming decade are to be for exclusive adoption by university graduates, the overwhelming majority of those new jobs will be in technology and medicine.

And our Cambridge graduate sat down to bemoan her boss long before the coronavirus crisis. As the furlough scheme comes to an end, optimistic estimates suggest a peak for UK unemployment at 9.7 per cent later this year - others predict 13 per cent or more by the middle of 2021. With much of Asia closed to travel, even 1-2-1 pennies are no longer available to pick up (and all day give dubious luck). This implies either an increase in the number of graduates searching for domestic jobs or - as many predict - a great surge in masters hopefuls. With such universally dismal job prospects across the country, it is hardly a stretch to imagine undergraduates pinning hopes on further study. In a year’s time, the “postgraduate” year will return to the job market only to find it awash with two-a-penny copies of their hard-earned certification.

Back in Paddy’s, the brave few foreign faces who didn’t flee - passport between their legs - at the beginning of the outbreak are feeling better over their Guinness and grumbling. Almost all schools have resumed face-to-face teaching and the money is as good as it ever was. Grinning at me across the internet, a Serbian friend in Chongqing relates: “everyone said to get out! Look at them all now, trying to get back in.” She completed a prestigious STEM masters degree in 2014 and followed it with a year of networking and experience in an industry graduate programme. Failing to find any work after the entire ordeal, she moved to Southern China for a job teaching English drama. Now making considerably more than any of her unemployed friends back home, she is holding the first class ticket for all it’s worth. None of China’s well-salaried teaching positions offer anything in the way of career progression, but for many, a paid-for existence pays for itself. To quote my friend: “there’s no ‘up’ from here, but there’s only ‘down’ if I leave.”

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