He was a member of the 7th and 8th Standing Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference.
[citation needed] Yang's first name, You, was given by Sun Bingwen (one of the early leaders of the Chinese Communist Party), who adapted it from the sentence 芃芃棫朴，薪之槱之 in the Classic of Poetry.
In 1935 he arrived in the United Kingdom at the age of 18 to begin his education at the University of Glasgow.
In November 1944 he was sent to shipyards and schools across the East Coast of the United States to study ship design and construction, production planning management, and engine repair.
[4] After the establishment of the People's Republic of China in 1949, he successively served as professor at Tongji University and Dalian Institute of Technology, director of Dalian Shipyard, assistant chief engineer of the Sino-Soviet Shipbuilding Company.