The public’s worries about the economy increased in August as a result of months of generally depressing data, particularly high rates of youth unemployment, and lottery ticket sales in China surged to their highest level for any month this year.

According to data from the finance ministry, the official Xinhua news agency reported on Saturday that nationwide lottery ticket sales increased by 53.6% in August from a year earlier to 52.96 billion yuan ($7.25 billion).

National lottery ticket sales from January to August were 375.76 billion yuan, up 51.6% from the same period last year.

Sales of lottery tickets surged at the same time as months of primarily weak economic news, with policymakers paying particular attention to the unemployment rate of job searchers between the ages of 16 and 24.

According to official data, China’s young unemployment rate reached a record high of 21.3% in June.

Some social media commenters have connected the recent dramatic increase in lottery purchases to the growing economic anxiety among young people.

“Young people are more likely to win 5 million yuan in the lottery than to earn 5 million from work,” one wrote on the popular Chinese microblog Weibo.

In August, the nation’s statistics agency abruptly halted releasing the number on teenage unemployment, claiming it had been paused while authorities worked to “optimise” its data collection technique, setting off a firestorm of outrage on social media.

Unemployed graduates are abandoning cities that have historically served as a stepping stone to middle-class affluence as a result of rising property costs and a faltering economy.

Earlier this year, footage of jobless university grads visiting temples to seek the gods’ blessings erupted on China’s social media.

“The worse the economy is, the more lottery tickets will be sold,” wrote another commentator on Weibo.

(Adapted from Medium.com)