China＇s Urban Employment and Urbanization Rate： A Re-estimation

The present paper argues that China＇s existing population and employment statistics are misleading, and have failed to include many of the migrant and labor force flows between urban and rural areas. The paper reconciles the differences between official census data and other survey statistics and attempts to recalculate China＇s urban population and employment figures. Our analyses indicate that official statistics of 2012 underestimate China ＇s urban employment by approximately 47 million while overestimating rural employment by 31 million. The adjusted urbanization rate exceeded 55 percent in 2012, almost 3 percentage points higher than the official statistics. Nevertheless, there remains much potential for rural-to-urban migration. More specifically, if the current bottlenecks in household registration, social security and public welfare systems can be removed or relaxed, China＇s urbanization rate could rise by another l O percentage points or even more over the next decade.     

Poverty Reduction in China： The Contribution of Popularizing Primary Education

Using the instrumental variable model and the regression discontinuity approach,this paper explores how access to primary education affects the Chinese labor market and helps people to escape poverty.Several important findings are obtained.The popularization of primary education has significantly reduced poverty in China,especially in urban areas.In contrast,the Compulsory Education Law has not been well implemented for older children in rural areas.In addition,the labor market premium for completing primary education is much larger in urban areas than in rural areas.Poor rural school quality might explain this rural-urban disparity.Effort needs to be made to further reduce poverty by ensuring adequate financial resources for primary education in poor areas and improving school quality in rural China.     

Impact of a Senior High School Tuition Relief Program on Poor Junior High School Students in Rural China

A significant gap remains between rural and urban students in the rate of admission to senior high school. One reason for this gap might be the high levels of tuition and fees for senior high school By reducing students＇ expectations of attending high school, high levels of tuition and fees could be reducing student aeademic performance in junior high schools. In this paper we evaluate the impacts of a senior high tuition relief program on the test scores of poor rural seventh grade students in China. We surveyed three counties in Shaanxi Province and exploited the fact that, while the counties are adjacent to one another and share similar characteristics, only one of the three implemented a tuition relief program. Using several alternative estimation strategies, including difference-in-differences, propensity score matching and difference-in-differences matching, we find that the tuition program has a statistically significant and positive impact on the mathematics scores of seventh grade students. More importantly, this program is shown to have a statistically significant and positive effect on the poorest students in the treatment group compared to their wealthier peers.     

People＇s Mobility and Guanxi Networks： A Case Study

The increase in the movement of people from rural to urban areas since the mid-1980s represents the largest labor migration ever experienced in China. Because migration is a process of selection, it is imperative that the major dynamics determining the selection are studied. What are the critical characteristics of migrants that help them to realize their mobility from rural areas to urban areas？ While educational attainment, gender, age, marital status and personal skills are important variables in the selection process, the present paper examines how social networks （guanxi connections） play a significant role in the process of migration selection in China. A case study from one of the northern villages in rural China is used to explore how social networks have shaped and given meaning to migration. The present paper elaborates on how people＇s social mobility has coincided with and been reinforced by people＇s physical mobility.     

Effect of Migration on Children＇s Self-esteem in Rural China

China＇s rapid economic growth has been facilitated by its large volume of rural to urban migration. China ＇s projected future development, especially increasing urbanization, implies that such migration will further intensify. However, migration does not come without cost. There are concerns about the potential negative impacts of migration on children＇s care, education, and, in particular, the self-esteem of children left behind in villages where one or both parents have out-migrated to cities. In this paper, we employ unique survey data collected from Shaanxi Province, where more than 4700 ninth grade students from 36 rural junior high schools in five counties were surveyed in late 2011. The results show that having both parents migrate into cities significantly reduced children ＂s self-esteem. The effects are also gender sensitive. Girls that had a father or both parents who had out-migrated were inclined to have lower self-esteem than boys. Moreover, our study findings indicate that parental migration decreased children ＂s self-esteem more for individuals with initial low self-esteem.     

Urban-Rural Divide and Policy Orientation: Peasants Flowing into Cities vs Capital Flowing Down to Rural Areas

IntroductionThe prolonged pursuit of a macroeconomic policy biased toward cities and industrial sectors has enlarged the differences between urban and rural areas. This is expressed in the gap in investment, which results in the gap in output, income, consumption and education. Such a wide gap has cut off the flow of goods and capital between the urban and rural markets, depriving agriculture and rural areas of their self-development capabilities. Peasants have     

Inequality and the Urban-rural Divide in China： Effects of Regressive Taxation

Using three comparable national representative household surveys for China in 1988, 1995 and 2002, the present paper reveals the regressivity and urban bias of China＇s direct tax and welfare system in this period It shows that a regressive taxation system and skewed allocation of subsidies increases the urban-rural income gap and enhances overall inequality. Modeling these relationships indicates that the relatively poorer rural population has a net tax liability, whereas those in the richer urban areas receive net subsidies. This pattern is common in China, although the extent of the bias varies. This skewed system of tax and welfare payments is a major cause of the persisting urban-rural income gap and contributes to the overall income inequality in China. The abolishment of the agriculture tax in 2006 has had a positive impact on rural people ＇s livelihoods.     

Public Goods, Environmental Protection,and the Development Paradigm in Rural China

I. IntroductionIn order to industrialize, China has adopted a development strategy of Urban-RuralDivergence for a long time. A striking consequence of this is that a large amount of ruralresources have flown into urban areas through a variety of institutional arrangements.What came next are such public problems as the extreme imbalance between the urban andthe rural economy, extreme deficiencies of rural public goods, and the serious destructionof the ecological environment. Its fair to say …     

农村义务教育辍学原因与农户家庭基本情况的关联分析

The main purpose of this paper is concerned about children‘s discontining study in rural areas or dropout phenomena in rural children‘s education, and their relationships with the economic condition of the rural households. The conclusion is that family income, parents‘ education level and structure of family operations have cross-impact on the education of a country child. To reduce the dropout rate of rural children, a key measure is to increase farmer‘s income, but income increase alone is not sufficient. It is argued that reducing dropout is a relatively long-term process that cannot be solved with shot-term government policy adjustment. To increase the rate of junior middle school education in rural areas, an overall economic and social development in rural areas is necessary.     

Do Poor Rural Households Produce Less Grain than Non-poor Rural Households

China＇s poor rural households produce substantially less grain compared with non-poor rural households. The present paper applies a decomposition approach and uses China＇s rural household survey data to investigate the causes of this grain output gap The paper first compares the grain output gap between poor and non-poor rural households, and then decomposes the gap into differences in yield and area sown, The results indicate that the gap in grain output mainly results from differences in the amount of inputs used in production. Differences in the number of labor days and the level of intermediate inputs account for 13.6 and 47.S percent of the gap, respectively. Poor rural households are also less efficient in their use of intermediate inputs, which contributes to 13.2percent of the gap. However, the efficiency of poor households＂ labor days reduces the gap by 7.2 percent, while agricultural physical capital, househoM head education and agricultural training have no substantial impact on the household grain output gap.     

Do Nutrition and Health Affect Migrant Workers＇ Incomes？ Some Evidence from Beijing,China

Migrant workers have become a major element of the labor force in Chinese cities, making important contributions to the economy while forming a socially disadvantaged group. Existing research on the relationship between the level of nutrition and health and income in China mainly focuses on farmers living in rural areas. Based on a Mincer equation and using a survey in Beijing, this paper examines the relationship between migrant workers＂ nutrition and health levels and their monthly incomes. We find that the nutrition intake and the body mass index have positive effects on income while duration of illness and daily working hours have negative effects. These conclusions imply that the Chinese Government should put more emphasis on improving migrant workers＇ well-being, including offering educational programs on nutrition and health, and enhancing medical insurance and the old-age insurance system.     

Retesting the Separability of China＇s Rural Households

This article retests the separability of China’s rural households in light of growing doubt about the sustainability of high economic growth in China.If a household’s production decisions are "separable "from the household’s consumption decisions,generally this suggests there is no surplus labor.Many scholars aver that China’s surplus rural labor has spurred rapid economic growth,but concerns have arisen as to whether China still has surplus labor available.We investigate this issue using rural household panel data from 1993 to 2009.The regression results confirm that households in rural China have progressed from being non-separable to separable.The estimation results for both the entire country and regions reject the separability hypothesis before 2004 but fail to reject the hypothesis after 2004(with the exception of the central region).These results suggest that China ’s surplus labor supply is dwindling,especially in the eastern and the western regions.The sustainability of China’s high economic growth is questionable in the absence of a large reservoir of surplus rural labor.     

Process-Oriented Management in Public and Private Sector

The aim of the paper is to discuss the differences between the process-oriented management in public sector organizations and private sector organizations. It is also to present the consequences of implementation of this approach and to suggest areas for further research. The process management is based on the assumption that actions should be optimized by taking into account processes, which create the dynamics of an organization. These processes are constituted by sequences of activities, which turn ideas and efforts of members of an organization into an outcome expected by a client. It seems that the implementation of the process-oriented management in organizations of the public administration may facilitate the following current clients needs and identifying new ones, which are due to changes in needs of citizens or legal requirements. The paper gives an account of the process-oriented management approach and consequences of its implementation in public sector organizations. It also discusses the obstacles to the process-oriented management implementation, primarily in the public sector. The paper is theoretical and the presented ideas need further empirical investigation. The findings can be used to enhance process-oriented management systems both in the public and private sector.     

Analysis of innovative water-saving irrigation systems in rural areas ——Taking Taocheng in Hebei province as an example

Since China＇s rural areas is short of groundwater resources, one focus in water management study is water waste in irrigation in rural areas. The root causes of water waste are inefficient management and market-based instruments which are due to the ＂common pool resources＂ property of water resources, and this property ultimately results in ＂public tragedy＂. Farmers＇ awareness of water saving and water resources＇s use efficiency can be promoted through the innovation of systems, the introduction of collective action, the establishment of autonomous organizations of water users, the implement of participatory management of water users, and the price adjustment by economic means. Saving water through system arrangement enriches the content of water resources management in theory and provides system sustainment for water-saving in engineering and agriculture in practice.     

The Reform of China＇s Rural Land System

This paper discusses the reform of China‘s rural land system in the past more than 20 years. It reviews the course of China‘s rural land system reform since 1978 and the enormous contribution that the household contract responsibility system made to China‘s agricultural and rural development. Then it summarizes the current situation and existing problems in China‘s rural land system. Finally, it offers some policy suggestions on how to perfect the rural land system.     

Local ＂Land Finance＂ in China＇s Urban Expansion： Challenges and Solutions

This paper considers the issue of local ＂land finance＇＂ in the context of China ＂s fast urban expansion. In an analysis of China ＂s land requisition and public leasing system we argue that low-cost land acquisition is the fundamental cause of land-related distortions that have occurred during China ＂s urbanization. Granting farmers the power to negotiate directly with land users during urban expansion, combined with coordinated land tax reforms to consolidate local tax bases is the key to China achieving both equity and land use efficiency in urban expansion.     

China＇s Labor Transition and the Future of China＇s Rural Wages and Employment

This paper contributes to the assessment of China＇s rural labor markets. According to our data, the increase in off-farm employment that China experienced during the 1980s and 1990s continued during the 2000s. Our analysis shows that migration has become the most prevalent off-farm activity, although the destination of migrants is shifting from outside of one＇s province to destinations closer to home. The present paperfinds that large shares of male and female individuals, especially those under 40 years, are working off the farm. These findings represent an important contribution to the labor economics field. First, the results of the present paper reveal that the labor transition from the agricultural sector to the non-agricultural sector for key segments of China＇s rural labor force is nearly complete. Second, although a large share of China ＂s rural labor force work in agriculture, most of these workers are older men and women （and likely would not be willing to take low-wage, labor-intensive jobs）. Third, the rising unskilled wage rate in China is partially a result of the tightening of the labor force in the young age cohorts. Finally, due to factors associated with the one child policy and other demographic transition forces, successive age cohorts will continue to fall in absolute number in the coming decade. Assuming China＇s growth continues, we expect to see further wage increases since it will take higher wages to coax more workers to work off the farm.     

Exploring China's Potential Child Poverty

This paper estimates child poverty in China using 20IS data from the China Household Income Project.Applying the Alkire-Foster drawer approach,we constructed a multidimensional poverty indicator system that accounted for multiple factors contributing to a child's development and well-being,based on which we estimated multidimensional poverty experienced by children.Children s poverty varied by age,gender,rural/urban settings,and geographic region.By extending the Alkire-Foster drawer approach,two important features of child poverty in China were found,which had normally been neglected by per capita poverty measures:poor children in nonpoor families and unequal allocations to different children within the same families.The results showed that more than 40 percent of multidimensionally poor children lived in nonpoor families.Unequal resource allocation within families was observed in half of the families.These two features of child poverty require more policy attention and the Chinese government should prioritize addressing multidimensional child poverty.     

Regional Inequalities and Its Determinants in Rural China：An Empirical Study Based on Agricultural Household Level Data

Using 1000 agricultural household survey data in 2002, this paper employs Gini coefficient and the Theft index to explore the regional inequalities and its determinants in rural China. We first measure the overall rural income inequality, and then decompose it by region and by factor （source of income） respectively. Third, we construct an econometric model to analyze the determinants affecting the income inequality indexes. Our main finding is that although Gini coefficient and Theft index is at a normal level, we need to point out that there exists a risk that the income inequality may climb up with the misbalanced growth of regional economy without taking adequate policy into account. At the end of this paper, policy suggestion is given： governments should offer more financial support for the less developed rural areas, where income level is quite low. An alternative choice is to enhance the transfer payment for the low-income people, and help them to get access to profitable economic project. In the long run, it is especially important to strengthen the farmers＇ professional training, and to increase their migrant ability to nonagricultural career.