Travel agency offers staff 1b yuan in 'baby bonuses'

China's leading online travel agency Trip.com Group announced on Friday that it will provide 1 billion yuan ($137.74 million) in subsidies to support employees who choose to have more children. As the first Chinese company to introduce such a policy, which conforms with national efforts to encourage childbirth, it has sparked heated discussion among the public about the cost of raising children and the impact on women's careers.

Starting from July 1, both male and female employees who have worked at the company for three years or more will be eligible to receive an annual cash bonus of 10,000 yuan per year for each newborn until the child reaches the age of five, the company said.

"Employees are the greatest asset of the company and we are committed to creating a better and more supportive working environment for them," said James Liang, executive chairman of the board of Trip.com Group.

"Through the introduction of this new child care benefit, we aim to provide financial support that will encourage our employees to start or grow their families without compromising on their professional goals and achievements," said Liang, who is also a demographic economist.

In 2022, China recorded 9.56 million newborns, and the birthrate was 0.68 percent. It was the first time since 1950 that the annual population of newborns dropped below 10 million, and the third consecutive year the birthrate had dropped below 1 percent, according to the National Bureau of Statistics.

The high cost of raising a child has become an important factor that is affecting fertility rates. In China, the average cost of raising a child to the age of 18 is 485,000 yuan, equivalent to 6.9 times the annual per capita GDP, according to YuWa Population Research, a public welfare institution dedicated to population and related public policy research in China.

The cost of raising a child in China is higher than that in some developed Western countries, the institution said, adding the population of newborns in China declined for six consecutive years from 2017 to 2022.

Liang believes that family welfare policies such as inclusive child care services, equal maternity leave for men and women, protection of the rights of single-parent families, and open access to assisted reproductive technologies, can effectively help working women reduce the time and cost of parenting and achieve a win-win situation for both the families and employers.

"It's a move that shows strong corporate social responsibility. The measure demonstrates the company's determination to increase family welfare for employees and help promote population growth for the society," Ningbo Haishu Xiecheng Enter-prise Management Consulting said in a statement.

From a human resources management perspective, the policy can help increase an employee's willingness to stick with a company. The move will be beneficial to Trip.com, its employees and society in the long term, the consultancy firm added.

The baby bonuses have sparked intense online debate. Many women said that getting pregnant affects their opportunities to get promoted and advance their careers. Some companies prefer that female employees don't get pregnant, as it shortens their working time. Other netizens said the subsidies fall well short of covering the huge cost of bearing and raising a child.