One-person firms and ‘raising lobsters’: China hunts for new ways to create jobs in AI era

– Chinese lawmakers are championing more support for people to start businesses using artificial intelligence, a move that comes as the widening application of the technology stokes anxieties about jobs. One-person companies , or OPCs, emerged as a talking point at China’s top parliamentary meetings in Beijing in 2026 , where delegates called for more resources and better legal frameworks to boost the growing model of AI-enabled entrepreneurship. The term refers to entire businesses run by single founders without any employees , who instead outsource tasks to AI agents that can work 24/7 and with little supervision. For example, app…