A woman scratches a lottery ticket on August 10, 2023 in Beijing (AFP / Pedro PARDO)
Rising unemployment, work pressure… Difficult for young Chinese to earn a living. So many rely, out of spite or derision, on scratch cards with the hope of becoming rich.
Scratch cards have become so popular that even influencers have taken to the phenomenon.
Like Chen Ying, who spent 100,000 yuan (12,600 euros) on the purchase of games, which she scratches live in front of subscribers to her channel on the Douyin video application – the Chinese version of TikTok.
But the 26-year-old is not playing to win.
She is counting on the incredible popularity of the game among young people in order to inflate her number of subscribers. A successful bet, since they have gone from a few hundred to 45,000 in six months.
Sales of lottery games reached 274 billion yuan (34 billion euros) in the first half of 2023 in China – an annual increase of 50%, which analysts explain in particular by the sluggish economic situation.
Used lottery tickets on August 10, 2023 in Beijing (AFP / Pedro PARDO)
“It may also be because it’s not easy to make money today,” said Chen Ying.
“University graduates have trouble finding a job, a job that suits them. It pushes them to want to get rich, to maintain the will, the idea, to be able to get rich quickly.”
The statistics of recent months in China do not encourage optimism, with an economy that is sluggish and now at risk of deflation.
– Hard to get rich –
In this context, China announced on Tuesday to suspend the publication of unemployment figures for 16-24 year olds, after a record level in June (21.3%).
A third of Chen Ying’s subscribers are under the age of 23, and most are students.
A player scratches a lottery ticket on August 10, 2023 in Beijing (AFP / Pedro PARDO)
“In people’s subconscious, it’s getting harder and harder to get rich through work,” Huang Zhenxing, a professor at Shanghai University of Finance and Economics, told Chinese media Caijing recently.
The Chinese are therefore “more inclined to try scratch cards to see if they can become rich overnight, thanks to luck”, he pointed out.
Chen Ying’s followers on Douyin mostly tune in for the excitement of watching her scratch her cards.
“I try to gain popularity” and “to get more people to know me and my brand,” she explains.
Many others on social media are trying to cash in on the scratch card frenzy.
On Douyin, videos with the hashtag #Guaguale (named after a popular brand of scratch cards) rack up over 6.4 billion views.
– “Little pleasure” –
Curtis Cheng, 25, explains to AFP that he is playing more and more. And he’s not the only one: at noon and in the evening, the scratch card stand near his home is full of young people.
“I like the feeling of being able to try my luck,” he says. “If you don’t win, that’s okay. It’s a way to spice up your life.”
A woman buys a lottery ticket in Beijing on August 10, 2023 (AFP/Pedro PARDO)
But also, he says, to escape his daily life.
“I think young people have a growing need to try new things,” he explains. “They want a little bit of luck to improve their situation.”
Computer worker Erika Cui, 25, says a scratch game gives her an escape from her worries.
“The economy hasn’t been very good in recent years. In addition, the pressure at work and in everyday life is quite strong. In short, people’s mental health is becoming a bit worrying,” he said. She.
“When you play, you forget your life which sucks a little. This short little pleasure is more important than winning or not!”
For Erika Cui, the popularity of lottery games also comes from the desire of many young people to let go of the stress of work, studies and urban life.
“There is also a bit of self-mockery in all this. We say to ourselves, well, life is not great so let’s try a scratch card game, who knows, maybe we will win the jackpot!”
© 2023 AFP
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