To be more accurate, hardly anyone there works there either. I work for BPA. We do a lot of sitting and waiting for clearances but as far as work...a few of us (that were suckers) teach ground schools but more than 2 airplanes in the traffic patteren at once is cause for celebration around here. We have something like 50 on the ramp in Shijiazhuang alone.
Of the 45 or so instructors at the SJW base maybe 15 fly regularly (10 hours in a good week, usually less). There are another 10 or so of us that have passed our knowledge tests and wait for our Chinese check rides. The rest were not fortunate enough to win the lottery that is the Chinese written tests and so they do odd jobs, tutoring, or nothing as they wait the 28 days the Chinese require before a retest can be taken. Some have been playing that game as long as 6 months and it is seldom any fault on their part.
The main reason for that is the written tests which are rediculous. If you know the FAA material cold, and I do mean cold, then your chances of passing these are about 50/50 because the questions are written in horrible english and in many cases the questions or answers are simply wrong or mismatched. I was at an advantage because I spent the last 4 years teaching a lot of Austrians and Polish students so I'm pretty accustomed to questions that make no sense if you take them literally because of the language barriers. Still, my passing was as much luck as it was knowledge.
It depends on what you're looking for but if you need flight hours this isn't the place to be (they'll tell you 500-1000 a year, in reality about 300 if you're lucky enough to get through all the silly tests). On the bright side, it's easy money and your living expenses are nil so it's a great way to pay down training debts or save some quick cash.
The instructor corps here is a great group of guys (kind of have to be to skip halfway around the world to work as a CFI) so that helps you maintain your sanity a bit. If you want to travel to China on someone else's dime then it's ok.
There are a lot of things that keep us on the ground but ATC, and not always the military, is far and away the biggest culprit.
There are a lot of good people trying very hard here but stacked against Chinese corruption, poor maintanence, bad weather (caused primarially by the pollution here) and mind-boggling incompetance of the vast majority of our massive Chinese staff the obstacles are just too big.
This forum will probably turn into a lightening rod for a lot of nameless posters soon. There was another thread on PPRUNE about a year ago that turned into that. There are a lot of very frustrated people here and they have a right to be. Most are looking for other work. I'd say it's not so bad as long as you come for the right reasons (travel as opposed to flying hours).
I just call it like I see it.
Tailwinds,
Derek