Analysis: Youth Unemployment Surge Exposes Cracks in China’s Economic Transition

China’s youth unemployment hit an all-time high in August, underlining the mounting pressure on the world’s second-largest economy as millions of university graduates struggle to find a foothold in an increasingly tight labor market.

The jobless rate among people aged 16 to 24, excluding full-time students, climbed to 18.9% in August, according to data released Sept. 17 by the National Bureau of Statistics. The figure — up 1.1 percentage points from July — is the highest since the agency began tracking the indicator in December 2023. The surge coincides with a record 12.22 million new graduates entering the job market this year, 430,000 more than in 2024.