Why Not Take the Civil Service Exam Anymore?
The author summarized based on their seven failed attempts.
After filtering by education, major, age, and party membership, there’s hardly anything left to apply for. Even if you’re lucky enough to have one position eligible, check the applicant pool and location—you’re looking at one-in-a-thousand odds in remote areas.
Then there are civil service exam prep courses: online mock exams run 3 hours a day for 8 days, costing around three or four thousand yuan; offline versions over a little more than a week cost over ten thousand yuan.
There’s also an unwritten rule: any government position requires at least three candidates to proceed to the final round. If fewer than three qualify, the position gets cancelled (for example, only two people meet the cutoff—likely cancelled due to insufficient numbers; under three applicants may also be cancelled outright).
Overall, once hired, the workload isn’t negligible and the salary isn’t high. But most days you can clock in and out on time, with free time afterward for your own life, family, and hobbies. It’s not the best choice (pay is modest, but it’s stable), yet for the average person, the “value for time invested” ratio is quite favorable.
The ideal setup is for one person to pursue a high-risk, high-income career up front, while the other relies on steady government income. That way, the family has both upside potential and a solid safety net.
