BEIJING, Oct. 16 -The annual application for China's civil service examination started on Wednesday with at least 22,200 government spots to fill.

In the past the exam attracted scores of fresh college graduates, with a record of more than 1.5 million candidates competing for some 19,000 posts in 2013.

This years's application, however, kicks off amid China's ongoing crackdown on officials' extra perks, pomp dining and extravagance.

With the addition of China's reform drive to let the market better play a decisive role, some predict that there will be a drop of applicants this year.

But Sun Xiaoli, a professor with Chinese Academy of Governance, expects civil servant fever to continue. The frenzy was mainly caused not by officials' invisible perks but by its job security and respectable social status, she said.

"Many people take it for granted that material benefits will come with a post in the government, but for those working at the grassroots level, it is not the case. On the contrary, they lead a very hard life," said Sun.

While the exam helps select a large number of high-quality civil servants, many people have feared it may hamper China's innovative spirit.

Even Edmund Phelps, a Nobel Laureate in economics, slammed the frenzy of civil servant applicants in 2013, saying fresh-graduates applying to become civil servants are wasting their talent.

One reason why so many fresh graduates prefer landing a government post is that it is too difficult to find a good job, said Yin Weimin, China's human resources and social security minister in a previous interview with Xinhua.