China: Babysitting job with a salary of thousands of dollars

(Baonghean) - A woman advertised for a postpartum nurse with high income, annual leave and social insurance.

This year's baby fever has created another fever: the search for babysitters. Salaries for nannies have been pushed up to thousands of dollars a month in China.

The number of people looking for nursing assistants to care for newborns and mothers has skyrocketed since the beginning of this year. Some customers even had to call to book in advance as early as last September. According to Chinese beliefs, postpartum women and newborns need to be cared for by experienced hands. Most of these postpartum nurses are from domestic help service centers.

Five years ago, in major cities in China, the average salary for this profession was $550. Last year, that figure tripled to more than $1,500. "We currently have about 80 customers who have signed up to hire postpartum nurses over the phone. The babies will be born between mid-March and September this year," said the general manager of a domestic help service center.

Many people are quite optimistic when realizing that this is an industry with potential and promises to develop even more in the future.

Nhat Hung (synthesis)