Expectations of postgraduate studies yet to be proven in jobs

THE NATIONAL entrance examination for postgraduate studies was held on Saturday and Sunday. According to official data, 1.77 million people have applied for the exam, 7 percent more than last year. Many graduates choose postgraduate study in the hope of a better future, but will it truly grant them one? West China Metropolis Daily says:

Festival buying spree shows emptiness of spirit

AN APPLE, whose Chinese name pingguo sounds close to the word for Christmas Eve, was reportedly sold at 176 yuan ($27) on the Internet during Christmas, with the extra benefits including a fine wooden box for the apple and handmade flowers and chocolate. Costly as it is, the package has been purchased by many Christmas celebrators in the country. A comment on rednet.cn questions such festival-oriented spending and attributes it to the spiritual emptiness of a number of Chinese people:

Migrants may opt to return to rural life

BIDDING farewell to the countryside for a better future in big cities was once the dream of millions of rural residents. However, a survey by a statistics bureau in Sichuan province, Southwest China, showed that about 54 percent of migrant workers in nine cities in the region are reluctant to change their rural household registration or hukou into an urban one. A regional website cnhubei.com comments:

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Canceling late-marriage leave

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Shift to a more sustainable world has begun

Ask anyone for their abiding memory of 2015 and they will most likely recall a negative one.

The world economy's labor pains

The ongoing global economic slowdown, which began in 2008 with the financial crisis in the United States, could set a new endurance record.

Proper law can streamline e-loan platforms

A series of scandals involving online financing platforms, including Fanya Metal Exchanges, Ezubao and Dada Group, have come to light in recent times. These former online financing services are under investigation, and investors risk not getting back their assets worth hundreds of billions of yuan.

Japan's record defense budget unsettling region

The record-high defense budget Japan's cabinet approved on Thursday is heavily geared toward expanding the role of the country's Self-Defense Forces and broadening the cooperation between Japan and the United States.

Inquiries over the use of lottery revenue laudable

It is good to know that the top legislators are "indignant" at the chaos surrounding government-run lottery revenues.

Government duty of care

Financial and other aid to parents who have lost their single child for one reason or another is an obligation the government should never shirk, as their misery has resulted from the fact that it is the State policy that allowed them to have only one child.

Narrowing widening income gaps ought to be focus of tax reform

THE CENTRAL AUTHORITIES HAVE RECENTLY PUBLISHED A PLAN on tax reform that echoing the public calls for a personal income tax system that aims at collecting more from those with high incomes. That's still unfair because those in the so-called high-income group are still wage earners, while those getting profits from properties can easily evade tax, says a Southern Metropolis Daily: