BEIJING: A company in China threatened to fire its single and divorced employees for not getting married.
As per media reports, Shandong Shuntian Chemical Group Co. Ltd., issued a notice to its employees urging single employees aged 28-58, including those divorced, to get married to avoid termination.
The company threatened to fire its single and divorced employees if they remained single and didn’t settle down by the end of September this year.
The company ann after the government announced a marriage program, but it had to reverse its decision after receiving heavy criticism on social media and accusations of violating China’s labour laws.
The news went viral on social media the company was heavily criticised for adopting this controversial policy. The internet users termed the policy as a violation of personal freedom and labour law, which led the company to withdraw the policy after government intervention.
Shandong Shentian Chemical Group Co., Ltd., which employs more than 1,200 people, suddenly introduced a policy to promote marriage among employees, telling those who were not married by March that they would have to resign from their jobs.
The company said it aimed to rationalise the policy by promoting traditional Chinese virtues such as hard work, loyalty and religious observance. The company also argued that remaining single was “disloyal” to the government’s efforts to increase the marriage rate and “unfair” to colleagues’ expectations.
The company’s policy sparked outrage on Chinese social media, with users calling it an attack on personal freedom. Most said China’s marriage law recognizes a person’s right to decide whether or not to marry.
Legal experts also called the policy unconstitutional, with Yan Tian, an associate professor at Peking University Law School, saying the move violated China’s labour laws, which prohibit companies from inquiring about employees’ marital or childbearing plans.
Govt intervenes after criticism
As public anger intensified, the local Human Resources and Social Security Bureau inspected the company on February 13, and the next day, authorities ordered the company to cancel the policy, saying it violated labour laws. Shentian Chemical Group said it had cancelled the notice and no employees would be fired based on their marital status.
Decline in marriages in China
The marriage rate in China has been steadily declining, with the number of marriages in China in 2024 falling to 6.1 million, down 20.5 percent from a year earlier. The country has not stopped recording a rise in birth rates for the first time since 2017, largely due to cultural desires to have a child in the year of the dragon. To combat the falling marriage rate, some local governments have also announced incentives, with one city in Shaanxi province offering a 1,500 yuan (US$200) prize to couples who marry before the age of 35.
