Civil service exam sees fewer applicants due to graft crackdown

China's once popular civil service exam saw fewer applicants this year and experts attributed it to the ongoing corruption crackdown, Saturday's China Daily reported.

About 1.06 million eligible candidates have signed up for the 2015 exam by Friday morning, compared with 1.52 million last year, said the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security.

The newspaper quoted ministry spokesman Li Zhong as saying that there are definitely fewer applicants for this year's exam, though the final number has not been available until Sunday.

This year the government opened at least 22,200 vacancies for candidates.

Civil service is always considered a good job with stable employment, good welfare like pension plan and income as well as high social status.

Official statistics show that an average of 57 candidates competed for each government post last year. In 2003, the figure was only 16 hopefuls competing for a post.

Candidates are attracted to the job by good welfare benefits and prestige it can bring but the reality can be different, said Zhang Yan, a researcher with the Shaanxi Academy of Social Sciences.

The ongoing campaign to curb bureaucracy and extravagance in civil service since the current leadership took office in late 2012 has required officials to practice frugality and fiercely punished those violating the rules.

The measures to cut red tape have produced uncertainty in some departments, even the previously powerful ones, said Prof. Yan Jirong with Peking University.

Zhang Yan said it is time to abandon the thought that being a civil servant is an easy job, adding that the most important quality for the job is the willingness to serve the people.

Zhang believes that the civil servant "fever" will cool down and the "iron rice bowl" will be broken with reform of the administrative system. "Actually, the change has already started."