According to a research report released by Hubei provincial job centres association, the average pay offer available in April at Wuhan job centres was Rmb1,322 a month, up 2 per cent over March. The biggest demand was for sales and marketing executives, accounting for 32 per cent of all offers in the job centres. Demand for building engineers, landscape architects and surveyors increased steadily over the first four months due to increasing investment in infrastructure projects in Wuhan. Demand for advertising executives fell by 11 per cent over March as companies across the board have cut back on their advertising budgets in the current economic downturn.

Separate figures show that take-home pay for residents of 16 cities in the Yangtze River Delta continued to rise in the first quarter. The largest increase was for those living in Hangzhou, Zhejiang province, where wages grew 18.2 per cent over the same period last year. Other cities that recorded a double digit increase included Yangzhou (12.8 per cent), Nantong (12 per cent), Zhenjiang (11.3 per cent), Taizhou (11.1 per cent), Suzhou (10.7 per cent) and Nanjing (10.5 per cent). Residents of Suzhou earned average an quarterly wage of Rmb7,792, the highest in Jiangsu province.