Civil servants are an important part of all levels of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) civil bureaucracy, and are also the most extensive and fundamental force over which the CCP maintains its rule.

Since the founding of the People's Republic of China (PRC), civil servants, known as Party cadres, have been treated so well that the Party's own media has called their treatment "super-national." Their wages and various explicit and implicit benefits have constantly risen.

However, civil servants in the CCP's ruling bodies in some of China's richest provinces have recently seen their salaries and benefits slashed – a rare and serious occurrence that suggests that something is very wrong with China's economy and that the communist regime is in something of a financial crisis.

According an article published by the Chinese news agency Duowei, these cutbacks are mainly due to the combination of COVID-19, the trade war, and floods in many parts of China this year. The article stated that almost all Chinese provinces are in deficit this year, with only Shanghai showing a surplus.

Other factors, according to other analyses and reports, include the massive spending on Xi Jinping's Belt and Road Initiative and other projects, as well as a huge problem in China's business environment, with a large number of enterprises going bankrupt and entrepreneurs generally losing faith in the CCP and being reluctant to invest and expand. As a result, the country's tax revenues have not risen, and the economic foundation is being undermined.

'Civil Servants In China Were Considered To Be The Most Reliable Jobs'

"The talks about civil servants' pay cuts this year seem to be true in some parts of China (many friends who are civil servants themselves have confirmed the news). Provinces and cities such as Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Guangdong, Fujian, and Shanghai may be hit by the first wave. Someone disclosed on Weibo that in December, civil servants in Shanghai, Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Guangdong, Fujian and other provinces and cities received salary reduction notices, with a cut of about 20 to 30%.

"This source gives an example: the annual salary of the director of the police station in Shanghai was reduced from 350,000 yuan to less than 200,000 yuan, and the annual salary of section-level civil servants was reduced from 240,000 yuan to 150,000 yuan.

"When I first saw the news, I was shocked. Civil servants in China were considered to be the most reliable jobs even among the iron rice bowls, but now they got a salary cut! It left me speechless!

"The state has a unified national standard for the 'Headship Pay Grades' of civil servants. That is to say, according to the Headship Pay Grade, the salary of civil servants in Jiangxi and Guizhou is similar to that in Zhejiang and Guangdong. But the standard of the Headship Pay is quite low, and will not cause too much fiscal burden.