China's Workers' Daily demands AI labor protections as 70 million jobs face displacement risk

China's Workers' Daily calls for AI labour protections

China's Workers' Daily, the official newspaper of the All-China Federation of Trade Unions, has published an editorial urging regulators to protect labour rights as AI spreads. The piece calls for stronger oversight of AI algorithms and warns that automation aimed solely at cutting jobs should not be left to market forces, as Citigroup estimates 70 million Chinese workers face AI-driven displacement. China's Workers' Daily, the official mouthpiece of the country's umbrella trade union, has published a pointed editorial urging government agencies to protect labour rights as artificial intelligence spreads across the economy. The newspaper, which is published by the All-China Federation of Trade Unions, titled the piece: "With the AI wave surging, how can we build a strong 'dam' for workers' rights?" The editorial called on regulators to improve labour standards and strengthen oversight of AI algorithms. It warned that AI adoption aimed solely at reducing human labour should be "approached with caution" and "should not be left entirely to market forces." "The benefits of technological advancement should be shared by society as a whole, rather than becoming a tool for a small number of employers to undermine workers' rights," the newspaper wrote, according to Bloomberg. A fragile labour market faces AI disruption The intervention comes as China grapples with the tension between its ambitious AI adoption targets and an already fragile labour market. Beijing's "AI Plus" initiative targets 70% AI adoption across key sectors by 2027, scaling to 90% by 2030, according to a State Council guideline published last year. Citigroup has estimated that China's AI adoption could reportedly displace 70 million workers, with roughly 9.6% of all Chinese jobs at high risk of AI-driven displacement. That risk rises to 13.6% for workers in their 20s, according to a Reuters analysis. Chinese enterprises are already quietly implementing small-scale layoffs as they seek AI-linked productivity gains. Under Chinese labour laws, companies must seek government approval for job cuts exceeding 10% of their workforce, so firms are restructuring in increments small enough to avoid regulatory scrutiny. Workers' Daily identifies two core problems The editorial, part of a series on labour protections during what it calls the "AI wave," identified two categories of concern. The first is violations of personal rights through what it described as "distilling" white-collar skills, where companies extract employee expertise to train AI models that then render those same workers redundant. The second is algorithmic opacity for couriers and drivers. Platform workers face opaque systems governing order allocation, pricing, and route planning, with little insight into how those decisions are made. China recently formalised protections for more than 200 million gig workers, mandating algorithm transparency, minimum wages, and maximum working hours enforced by apps themselves. The new rules require compliance by 2027. Courts and regulators are already acting The editorial does not exist in a vacuum. Chinese courts have already begun ruling in favour of workers displaced by AI. A court in Hangzhou ruled in April 2026 that a tech firm had illegally fired a quality assurance supervisor after it automated his role. The ruling stated that AI replacement does not constitute valid grounds for dismissal. A separate arbitration ruling in Beijing in December 2025 reached a similar conclusion, finding that a company's decision to adopt AI was a business choice rather than an uncontrollable event. Both rulings established that companies must retrain or reassign workers before terminating them, according to Fortune. The Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security announced in January 2026 that it would accelerate development of an AI employment impact monitoring system and issue a dedicated policy document addressing AI's effects on the labour market, according to state media. A balancing act between ambition and stability The government has reportedly been warning employers, especially tech companies, not to cut jobs openly. Companies that demonstrate AI-driven productivity gains while maintaining headcount are more likely to receive favourable treatment from regulators and state media. The challenge is structural. The Stanford AI Index 2026 found that China has narrowed the US-China AI performance gap to just 2.7% while spending 23 times less on private AI investment. The speed of AI-driven job creation reportedly lags behind the speed of displacement. China is already wrestling with persistent youth unemployment, making the stakes of getting this balance wrong considerably higher. Workers' Daily, which was founded in 1949, the same year as the People's Republic, has long served as the party's channel for signalling labour policy priorities. Its editorial series on AI protections suggests Beijing is preparing a more comprehensive regulatory framework to manage AI's impact on employment. That approach differs sharply from the laissez-faire stance taken in the United States and much of Europe. Whether China can maintain its breakneck pace of AI adoption while genuinely protecting the workers it displaces remains the central question. The courts and the trade union press have drawn the rhetorical line. The test now is enforcement.

AI sparks alarm in China with call to protect worker rights

China's rapid adoption of artificial intelligence in the workplace has prompted an unusually blunt call from a state-run newspaper to protect labor rights, as Beijing considers how to contain risks posed by the new technology. In an editorial published on Thursday, the Workers' Daily -- the official mouthpiece of China's umbrella trade union organization -- urged government agencies to mount an active response as new threats emerge to the rights of employees. It called on regulators to improve labor standards and strengthen oversight of AI algorithms, including by giving a greater say to trade unions and workers' representatives. "The benefits of technological advancement should be shared by society as a whole, rather than becoming a tool for a small number of employers to undermine workers' rights," the editorial said. It was titled "With the AI wave surging, how can we build a strong 'dam' for workers' rights?"