BEIJING – A series of confrontations on public transport between elderly and younger Chinese has cast a spotlight on generational tensions amid slowing economic growth.

       In particular, issues such as unhappiness with the country’s pension system and high stress levels experienced by those who are younger, as well as divergent values between retirees and youth have come to the fore.

       Just recently on Aug 7, netizens called for the suspension of the pension system after a video showing a 69-year-old retiree beating up a 23-year-old unemployed man in a subway train in eastern Shandong province went viral.

       It was unclear how the fight started, but the older man reportedly said he was going to help society zheng dun, or teach the younger man, who was earlier rude to him, a lesson. The younger man ended up with a nose fracture.

       Similar calls online to end the country’s pension system were made following another conflict on June 24. Netizens saw the subway showdowns as signs that the elderly’s sense of entitlement was getting out of hand.

       In the June 24 incident, a 65-year-old man assaulted a younger woman on a crowded subway train in Beijing when she refused to give up her seat to him.

       According to the viral video, he then scolded her loudly for being disrespectful, while using his walking stick to hit her thighs.

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       These were among at least four incidents on public transport involving arguments between the young and the old since April that went viral on social media.

       In 2023, a similar chain of incidents prompted the official Xinhua news agency to warn in an editorial on Nov 2 not to let divisive syndromes such as yan lao and yan tong (despising the old or young) create a hateful society.

       Analysts told The Straits Times that generational tensions are present in every country. However a growing sense of anxiety among Chinese youth over dimming economic prospects and a shift away from traditional values have resulted in a particularly taut relationship between China’s old and young.

       The country’s economic recovery since Covid-19 restrictions were lifted in December 2022 has been fragile and dragged down by a regulatory clampdown on its formerly high-flying tech and property sectors. Other sectors, including retail, have also been affected by the clampdown.

       World Bank data shows that the percentage of Chinese who are of working age between 15 and 64 years old fell to 45 per cent in 2023. This is down from a high of 82 per cent between 1964 and 1967.

       The unemployment rate for those aged between 16 and 24 – excluding students – is 13.2 per cent as at June 2024.

       Simmering generational tensions have thrown up well-documented problems, including how parents and their adult children have fallen out due to pressure on younger Chinese to get married and have kids, which many older folk see as filial piety or patriotism.

       Younger Chinese, however, have cited the high cost of raising a child and complained that their concerns are not being understood by the older generation.

       The latter had greater financial security during China’s most prosperous years, post-1980s till the 2000s. Then annual gross domestic product growth began to fall to the single digits, down from the double-digit yearly expansion.

       Public benefits were better then as well, with older Chinese getting apartments for free from the government, and the cost of living was lower.

       Housing, particularly in top-tier cities like Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou, remains a heavy financial burden for young Chinese who are hoping to start a family.

       Sociologist Pei Xiaomei at Tsinghua University in Beijing said that to the older generation, values such as zun lao ai you or “respecting the elderly, caring for the young” and filial piety are unconditional.

       “Youth today tend to think that respect should be earned, and they hope that the elderly can conduct themselves well before demanding respect,” she added.

       Analysts also pointed out that older Chinese spent their youth making sacrifices for and respecting their elders at home and in their community, and feel short-changed now that it is their time to be treated well.

       Professor Pei pointed out that China’s meteoric rise – since opening-up reforms began in the 1980s – to become the world’s second-largest economy today has created major socio-economic changes. “The lives of these two age cohorts are so vastly different that they might as well have been living in separate worlds.”

       Those who have reached retirement age today – 60 for men and 50 or 55 for women – would have been born during the Cultural Revolution, which took place between 1966 and 1976. They would have grown up in the 1980s, during China’s most optimistic period as the economy was growing at its fastest.

       But their growing-up years were also a period of major change in the country, with a greater emphasis on the public education system, which was severely disrupted during the Cultural Revolution.

       Today’s young Chinese are the most educated in the nation’s history, with a record 11.79 million university graduates this year.

       Privacy is another concept that some older Chinese, who are used to communal living, struggle with, analysts said. In April, an elderly woman tried to shame a younger passenger on a sleeper train for putting up blinds on the lower bunk and not allowing her companion, who was reportedly in her 70s, to sit on the edge of the bed.

       Prof Pei said: “It’s hard to talk to older Chinese about boundaries and privacy because these concepts did not really exist during their time.”

       Associate Professor Michael Kwan at the China-Europe International Business School in Shanghai told ST that tensions are rising also because of the ageing problem. China’s population declined for the second consecutive year in 2023.

       “The proportion of older people has become much higher,” he said.

       Official statistics showed that in 2023, those aged 60 and above made up 19.8 per cent of the population, up from 10.2 per cent in 2000.

       The country’s famous one-child policy was in place between 1980 and 2015, and its fertility rate has continued to hit new lows despite official efforts to lift restrictions and encourage more births.

       An unequal distribution of resources has also added to the tensions, which is why the pension system is the target of youth unhappiness, analysts added.

       Official statistics show that the average monthly pension in 2022 for former government employees is about 6,100 yuan (S$1,120), while those who worked in private companies and state-owned enterprises receive about 3,150 yuan.

       The average monthly salary of a fresh graduate in 2023 was 6,050 yuan, according to Chinese education consultancy Mycos, with vocational school graduates making 4,683 yuan. Furthermore, the lack of job security amid a high youth unemployment rate has led to more anxiety among graduates.

       Professor Xiang Biao, a director at the Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology in Germany, said the stress levels experienced by the younger generation due to job insecurity may have resulted in their being hyper-sensitive.

       “The worry about doing better and standing out in the competitive job market puts many young Chinese on edge all the time. So when they get nagged at or told off for not taking better care of themselves or observing traditional values like respecting the elderly, they tend to flare up,” he added.

       Some may feel that the older generation “has taken up so many economic benefits, and now they want to claim moral superiority as well”, he noted.

       Part of the stress that youth face comes from how working adults are likelier than retirees to bear the brunt of the economic slowdown as they might lose their job or suffer pay cuts, he added.

       “But it is unlikely that the government will cut retirees’ pension, which actually gives the elderly more financial security than younger Chinese,” he said.

       Furthermore, the elderly are more likely to “organise themselves and protest if there are cuts to their pension due to their socialist education, and have more time on their hands” compared with working adults, who are tired and busy, Prof Xiang noted.

       Prof Pei said: “When today’s youth see the elderly in China enjoying guang chang wu (public square dancing) and travelling while they have to face so much stress each day and are still not sure of their retirement benefits, it is bound to create some unhappiness.”