Pretend work companies that help unemployed people fake having a job for a small price are springing up across China.
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The trend is particularly prevalent in first and second-tier cities where people rent office space and transform it into “pretend work companies”.
They usually charge people between 30 and 50 yuan (US$4 and US$7) a day. The rate drops if they buy a monthly package for a working spot.
Chen Yingjian owns one such company in Hangzhou, in eastern China’s Zhejiang province.
Chen conducts “pretend interviews” and sets up codes of conduct such as “working from 9am to 6pm”, “no smoking in the office” and “no office romances”.
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