Are all migrants really worse off in urban labour markets: new empirical evidence from China

Jason Gagnon, Theodora Xenogiani and Chunbing Xing

MPRA Paper from University Library of Munich, Germany

Abstract: The rapid and massive increase in rural-to-urban worker flows to the coast of China has drawn recent attention to the welfare of migrants working in urban regions, particularly to their working conditions and pay; serious concern is raised regarding pay discrimination against rural migrants. This paper uses data from a random draw of the 2005 Chinese national census survey to shed more light on the discrimination issue, by making comparisons of earnings and the sector of work between rural migrants on one hand, and urban residents and urban migrants on the other. Contrary to popular belief, we find no earnings discrimination against rural migrants compared to urban residents. However, rural migrants are found to be discriminated in terms of the sector in which they work, with a vast majority working in the informal sector lacking adequate social protection.

Keywords: Migration; China; Discrimination; Informal Employment (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: J24 J71 O15 R23 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2009-06
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cna, nep-dev, nep-geo, nep-lab, nep-mig and nep-tra
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (11)

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https://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/16109/1/MPRA_paper_16109.pdf original version (application/pdf)

Related works:
Working Paper: Are All Migrants Really Worse Off in Urban Labour Markets? New Empirical Evidence from China (2012)
Working Paper: Are All Migrants Really Worse Off in Urban Labour Markets? New Empirical Evidence from China (2011)
Working Paper: Are all Migrants Really Worse off in Urban Labour Markets?: New empirical evidence from China (2009)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:pra:mprapa:16109

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