Chinese Tech "996" Work Schedule

'996' means working 9am to 9pm, six days a week — 72 hours — and was defended openly by Chinese tech leaders, most notoriously when Jack Ma called it 'a blessing' in 2019. After the 996.ICU protest campaign on GitHub and several widely reported deaths of young employees, China's Supreme People's Court and labour ministry jointly declared the schedule illegal in August 2021.