It is not easy to be a small fish in a big pool. Perhaps, that's why a large number of college graduates are leaving big cities for smaller ones.

Spring is the time when fresh college graduates are recruited, and the past few years have seen a large number of graduates from even premier universities such as Peking University, Tsinghua University and Fudan University moving to provincial capitals or even smaller cities.

Peking University has said 35 percent of its graduates have decided to move from Beijing to other parts of the country this year. The number of Fudan University graduates who chose to stay in Shanghai last year fell by 4.1 percent over 2009 - many of them were willing to work in Hangzhou, Ningbo, Nanjing and other cities around Shanghai.

The National Bureau of Statistics divides China's cities into three tiers. Among the first-tier cities are Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou. Provincial capitals make up most of the second tier, with smaller cities making up the third.

Big cities have become unfriendly thanks to high housing prices, lack of social security benefits and the poor quality of living. But perhaps the main reason elite college graduates are opting for second- and third-tier cities is the abundant opportunities they provide. Short of talented people, many of these cities are offering sound welfare packages to graduates.

But there are people who still refuse to be "a frog in a well". They are determined to live in big cities for the abundant facilities and social amenities they provide such as convenient public transport and advanced healthcare system. And apart from their outstanding peers, they (some of who are rich) are also ready to take on foreigners.

Shanghai and Beijing are becoming new pastures of plenty for graduates from the United States, which has close to double-digit unemployment rate. American graduates with even limited or no knowledge of Chinese are lured by China's rising economy, lower cost of living and the chance to bypass the initial hassles that come with first jobs in the US.

But the 2011 Wealth Report, published by Citi Private Bank on April 6, shows Shanghai and Beijing are among the world's 10 top cities where the superrich prefer to live and invest.

Now that many graduates of elite universities are shifting to second- and third-tier cities, local authorities should come up with policies that would encourage the young workforce to stay rooted to build their career.

In some cities, young people are constrained by institutional drawbacks. They cannot rise in their professions unless they come from the "right background" or have guanxi (connections).

Such cities cannot hold back the young workforce - and thus help their own development - unless the local authorities remove the unnecessary obstacles from their path and smoothen the flow of their life.