The Shaanxi Qinyang Changsheng Brewing Co. hasn’t turned a profit since 2020.
Photographer: Qilai Shen/Bloomberg
China Forced to Keep Unprofitable Firms Alive to Save Jobs and Avoid Unrest
Saddled with the most loss-making industrial companies since 2001, Xi Jinping is trying to clean up his economy without triggering mass layoffs.
On the factory floor of a 69-year-old liquor plant in northwestern China, a dozen workers toil away sticking labels by hand on bottles of a fiery liquor known as baijiu, the nation’s most popular spirit.
The inefficiency on display at Shaanxi Qinyang Changsheng Brewing Co. — a firm that hasn’t turned a profit since 2020 — might seem like an anomaly in a country where robots are replacing manual labor. But it’s a scene replicated across the nation, as company owners and local officials go to great lengths to protect jobs and keep struggling firms alive.