500 former employees protest two state owned banks in Beijing

The intersection of people who disbelieve in social mood theories and who believe China will not have a serious slowdown is probably quite large. For the rest, the signs of declining social mood are piling up and coming faster. Today, workers from not one, but two major state-owned banks staged a public protest in Beijing. There were about 500 protesters in all and they assembled in Beijing's Financial Street area. ICBC protestors were calling for the resignation of ICBC Chariman Jiang Jianqing. They wore shirts that said, "I want to eat" and "I want to live." They were protesting buyouts as part of bank restructurings in the early 2000s. Some workers want compensation because they received low buyouts relative to subsequent bank income (and inflation). Others want their old jobs back.

By itself this isn't a big story, but 500 people is a pretty sizable amount for a protest in the financial district. This isn't workers in a factory walking off a job, these are people who organized and came from around the city. Also, it's noteworthy that inflation isn't even that bad at the moment compared to where it was in 2011 or 2007, so why is the protest happening in 2013?

北京建行工行總部爆發員工集體散步抗議事件