The recent global economic crisis, which escalated rapidly in the second half of 2008, has contributed to jolting shifts in the manufacturing sector in the United States and China as well as many other developed and developing economies. Even so, China’s manufacturing employment continued to grow from a total of 97.91 million at the end of 2007 to 99.01 million at yearend 2008. Though manufacturing workers in China are earning more than ever before, average hourly compensation costs were only $1.36 in 2008. China’s hourly compensation costs remain far below those of many of its East Asian neighbors like Japan ($27.80) and Taiwan ($8.68), but are roughly on par with those of others like the Philippines ($1.68).
Manufacturing employment in China peaked in 1996.
China’s employment and compensation costs in manufacturing through 2008
Despite large increases in recent years, hourly compensation costs in China’s manufacturing sector remained only 4 percent of those in the United States in 2008; that year, hourly compensation costs rose to $1.36, as China’s manufacturing employment continued to increase despite the beginning of the global economic downturn
by Judith Banister and George Cook
Monthly Labor Review • March 2011
Manufacturing in China
http://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/2011/03/art4full.pdf