The most instructive policy decisions are rarely those announced with fanfare, but rather those that emerge quietly, their full significance visible only when examined against a broader canvas.
In late 2025, China adjusted the maximum age for civil service applicants from 35 to 38 years, with provisions extending to 43 for candidates holding advanced degrees. The official explanation emphasized two objectives: combating workplace age discrimination and aligning recruitment practices with the country's gradually rising retirement age. These are, on their face, entirely reasonable justifications.
Yet policy, like architecture, rewards careful examination of its foundation. What appears as a straightforward administrative adjustment reveals itself, upon closer study, as a remarkably sophisticated response to intersecting pressures—demographic, economic, and social. The reform deserves analysis not as isolated technical change, but as a window into how a complex modern state navigates the challenging terrain where economic transformation meets human consequence.
The Context: Understanding "The Curse of 35"
To appreciate the reform's significance, one must first understand the phenomenon it addresses. The so-called "curse of 35" refers to an unofficial but widespread practice in China's private sector—particularly in technology and high-growth industries—of regarding employees over 35 as past their prime utility. This is not mere prejudice, though prejudice certainly plays a role. Rather, it reflects a particular economic logic that emerged during China's rapid development.
Industries built on intensive work schedules—the notorious "996" culture of 9 AM to 9 PM, six days weekly—optimized for younger workers who could sustain such demands, often lacked family obligations, and commanded lower salaries relative to their experience. As these workers aged into their mid-thirties, the calculus shifted: higher salary expectations, potential family responsibilities, and occasionally, a diminished willingness to accept unsustainable work conditions made them less attractive to cost-conscious employers.
"The tragedy of the curse of 35 lies not in its existence, but in its predictability—a generation that fulfilled every expectation of their society finding those same expectations weaponized against them."
The result is a peculiar form of career mortality: highly educated professionals, often at the peak of their intellectual and experiential capacity, finding themselves systematically excluded from opportunities in the very sectors they helped build. This represents not merely individual hardship, but a significant misallocation of human capital—a problem any thoughtful government must address.
The Sophisticated Logic of State Response
The civil service reform must be understood as part of a broader suite of responses to what we might call the "mid-career discontinuity problem." While the official rationale emphasizes anti-discrimination and retirement alignment, the policy serves several additional functions worth examining.
Managing Labor Market Pressures
China's labor market currently experiences simultaneous pressures at multiple points. Youth unemployment remains concerningly high—sufficiently so that data publication was temporarily suspended and later reformed. Simultaneously, the private sector's age-based displacement creates an experienced, educated cohort facing unexpected career precarity.
The civil service expansion addresses the latter challenge directly. By broadening eligibility, the state creates an absorption mechanism for displaced mid-career professionals. This serves practical purposes: it channels valuable expertise into public administration, maintains career continuity for a potentially vulnerable population, and—perhaps most importantly—prevents the accumulation of a large, educated cohort experiencing economic anxiety and underemployment.
The Geopolitical and Economic Backdrop
While not explicitly cited in official communications, the international economic environment provides important context. The technology and manufacturing sectors most associated with the "curse of 35" are precisely those most affected by evolving US-China relations, supply chain reconsiderations, and technological competition. As these industries contract or restructure, they disproportionately shed experienced, higher-cost employees.
The civil service reform can thus be understood as what economists might call a "counter-cyclical stabilization mechanism." Rather than allowing skilled workers to flow into unemployment or underemployment during sectoral adjustment, the state creates alternative pathways. This is not merely charitable—it's strategically sound. Maintaining the productive engagement of skilled workers prevents human capital depreciation and, importantly, maintains social cohesion during economic transition.
The Demographic Dimension
China's demographic challenges are well documented: an aging population, declining birth rates, and a shrinking working-age cohort—all consequences of rapid development and the former one-child policy. The gradual raising of retirement ages responds to these realities by extending working lives.
The civil service age adjustment complements this broader demographic strategy. If citizens are expected to work until 63 rather than 60, logically they should retain the opportunity to enter stable career paths somewhat later in life. The policy harmonizes different administrative systems—a mundane-sounding achievement that nonetheless matters considerably for individual life planning and social stability.
The Broader Pattern: State Capacity and Social Adaptation
What emerges from this analysis is a picture of sophisticated policy-making that operates on multiple registers simultaneously. The civil service reform addresses immediate, visible problems—age discrimination, administrative coordination—while also serving deeper functions related to economic stabilization, human capital allocation, and social cohesion.
This is worth noting not as exceptional, but as characteristic of how capable states navigate complex transitions. Economic transformation inevitably creates dislocations and discontinuities. The question is not whether these will occur, but how institutional systems respond. China's approach here demonstrates adaptive capacity: recognizing an emerging problem, understanding its sources, and deploying policy tools to address multiple dimensions of the challenge.
"The mark of mature governance lies not in avoiding difficult choices, but in making them with clear-eyed understanding of their necessity and consequences."
The "iron rice bowl" of state employment, long a symbol of security in Chinese society, becomes here a tool of economic management—a way of smoothing transitions, maintaining stability, and preserving social capital during periods of structural change. This represents not weakness but pragmatism, not retreat but adaptation.
Implications and Observations
Several observations emerge from this examination. First, the reform illuminates the challenges inherent in rapid economic development: the very growth strategies that powered China's transformation created certain structural problems—including the mid-career displacement issue—that now require sophisticated management.
Second, it demonstrates how policy serves multiple functions simultaneously. While we can identify primary objectives, effective policy typically addresses several challenges at once, even if some remain unspoken in official communications. Understanding policy requires reading both its explicit text and its implicit context.
Third, the reform highlights the continuing importance of state employment as a stabilizing force in economies undergoing significant structural change. The private sector, optimizing for profitability, may make rational decisions at the firm level that create problems at the social level. State institutions can serve as a necessary counterweight and adjustment mechanism.
Finally, this case study reminds us that even seemingly technical administrative changes can reveal much about how societies navigate the complex challenges of modern development. The details matter, but so does the broader canvas against which those details are painted.
Concluding Thoughts
China's civil service age adjustment represents neither simple magnanimity nor cynical manipulation, but something more interesting: sophisticated policy-making that acknowledges economic realities, addresses genuine human concerns, and serves broader social objectives. It recognizes that rapid development creates winners and losers, and that managing the consequences of that development requires active, thoughtful intervention.
Whether this approach proves sustainable over the long term remains to be seen. Much will depend on broader economic conditions, demographic trends, and the continued capacity of state institutions to balance multiple, sometimes competing objectives. But as a case study in how modern states navigate complex transitions, it merits serious examination.
The reform reminds us that in an era of rapid change and significant uncertainty, the space between market logic and human need requires careful tending. How societies manage that space—with what tools, guided by what values, serving what objectives—remains among the most important questions of our time.
References and Further Reading
- "China raises age limits for civil servants as part of campaign against ageism." The Straits Times
- "China Relaxes Age Cap for Civil Service Applicants to Match New Later Retirement Rules." Yicai Global
- "China's civil service to open 38,100 vacancies in 2026 intake with age limits for applicants relaxed." Global Times
- "China raises civil service exam age limits." China Economic Review
- "Just a Number: China Eases Age Restrictions on Civil Service." Sixth Tone
- "China bids to break job market 'curse of 35' as it raises civil service age cap." The Star