Welcome to Foreign Policy’s China Brief.

Tuesday marks the start of the Lunar New Year, and hundreds of millions of Chinese are home with their families, many of them enduring complaints about why they’re not married yet and the hours-long, televised Spring Festival gala.

Welcome to Foreign Policy’s China Brief.

Tuesday marks the start of the Lunar New Year, and hundreds of millions of Chinese are home with their families, many of them enduring complaints about why they’re not married yet and the hours-long, televised Spring Festival gala.

Most people enjoy a break from work at this time. In honor of the holiday, this week we’re going to talk about China’s work culture and what the West misunderstands about it.

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China’s Work Cultures

In recent months, certain corners of Silicon Valley have become obsessed with “996”: working from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m., six days a week. Though the term originated in China’s tech industry, it was coined as a critique of an unhealthy and illegal work culture, not an aspirational ideal. The 996 trend isn’t the norm—it’s closer to China’s version of start-up culture.

On paper, Chinese law limits the workweek to five days and 40 hours, with anything more requiring union-negotiated overtime pay. But in practice, labor law is something between a pleasant fiction and a cruel joke. The rules are........

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