OCCUPATIONS, WAGES AND LABOUR ORGANIZATION
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and published monthly by the Commerce and Industry Department.
Working Hours. Some Chinese concerns have a 7-day working week, and this is sometimes coupled with a 9-hour day. (These long hours are favoured by the workers, con- cerned, since their earnings are correspondingly greater.) Some of the more enlightened employers give a day off in every seven, and though the holiday is not paid, a day's wage as bonus is given if there has been no absence during the week. Hours of work for women and young persons are regulated by law in conformity with I.L.O. conventions.
The 48-hour week is standard in European undertakings and in Chinese concerns run on Western lines. In public utilities and in some of the cotton spinning and weaving mills, a system of three 8-hour shifts is used. The rest day is usually Sunday, except in concerns where continuous production must be maintained and rest days are accordingly arranged in rotation.
Cost of Living. In general, there was little change in cost of living during the year, apart from that caused by normal seasonal fluctuations in the price of certain foodstuffs. The price of rice remained relatively steady. The table below shows the fluctuations which occurred in the two officially published indices. The Food and Fuel Index is based on the prices of specific quantities of ten items of common consumption. The Retail Price Index covers a wider range of commodities and services, and is weighted according to a budgetary survey carried out in 1948. The base of 100 is for March 1947, and although the expenditure pattern used for weighting is that of the artisan and white collar worker, the Index gives a fair reflection of general changes in the cost of living. An independent survey of workers' budgets carried out by Mr. E. F. Szczepanik, Lecturer in Economics in the University of Hong Kong, in December 1955, tended to confirm the accuracy of the original survey.
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