Reports from several Chinese provinces indicate that local authorities have begun to suspend merit pay for public servants in the name of cleaning up a provocative situation, according to posts on social media. Some regions were even required to cough up previous pay they had received during a certain timeframe. The rare move has ignited speculation about what caused the move.
So far, megacities like Shanghai and Chongqing, and other cities in Guangdong, Hubei, Anhui, Henan, Jiangxi, Shandong, and Sichuan provinces are involved.
