Several told a senior government official in a recent live chat forum on www.gov.cn, the central government's Website that their wages have been rising at a lower pace than official figures suggest.

"Many of my colleagues have complained their wages have increased too slowly, and we don't have as much spending money as we did in recent years," an Internet user told Qiu Xiaoping, director of the wage department in the Ministry of Labor and Social Security.

The National Bureau of Statistics paints a rosier picture, however. The average annual inflation-adjusted income of Chinese workers has increased from 12,422 yuan (US$1,637) in 2002 to 21,001 yuan in 2006, the bureau said.

Another forum contributor said his wages had not increased by the rate indicated in the official statistics.

"Wages may rise in private companies but not in state-owned ones, like the one I work for," he said. "I haven't noticed any increase in my wages for years."

Qiu replied, "People may not feel there has been much of a rise in their incomes largely due to inflation."

From March to May, the Consumer Price Index hovered above the government target of three percent, with the price for meat jumping 26.5 percent and eggs soaring 37.1 percent in May.

Property prices, tuition fees and medical charges are still major burdens for ordinary Chinese.

The average housing price in 70 major Chinese cities rose six percent year on year in the first quarter of 2007, with the price in Shenzhen up 10.7 percent and Beijing 9.9 percent.

"Wages also increased at a different rate in various sectors," Qiu said.

The gap in average annual income between the highest wages and the lowest was 32,249 yuan in 2005 compared with 8,436 yuan in 2000.

The average salary of workers in China's monopoly sectors, such as telecommunications, finance and tobacco, is three times the national average, excluding bonuses, which often take salaries up to 10 times the national average.

Bu Zhengfa, former vice minister of the MLSS, has acknowledged that comparatively high salaries offered by monopoly, mostly state-owned firms has become the biggest problem in the country's income distribution system.

To narrow the gap, the government is planning to collect more taxes from monopoly firms, Qiu said.