Influential Factors in Employment Location Selection Based on “Push-Pull” Migration Theory—A Case Study in Three Gorges Reservoir Area in China

In China, farmers employed in non-farm work have become important socio-economic actors, but few studies have examined the farmers' perspective in making their work location choices. Based on "push-pull" migration theory, this paper utilizes sectional data from a 2013 survey of farmers in China's Three Gorges Reservoir area to empirically analyze the factors influencing migrant workers' choice of employment location. The results indicate that 60.46% of laborers have migrated from their home province, whereas 39.54% have remained in their home province. Focusing on personal, household, and community characteristics—in addition to the economic characteristics of the sample counties—multinomial logistic regression models reveal that farmer-laborers' employment location decisions are influenced by their personal capital endowment(age, years of education and social networks), family structure(the number of laborers, elders, children and students), home village characteristics(location, economic development level and the degree of relief of the land) and home county economic development level. Notably, male and female laborers' location decisions reveal a converging trend, and their differences are not pronounced. Per capita arable land area has little influence on location decisions, whereas the educational level of laborers has a significant impact. The results differ significantly from those found in previous studies.

Problems in Post-crisis Employment for Migrant Workers Remain Unsolved

As indicated by a survey of 105 villages in 19 provinces and cities, the 2008 international financial crisis had a serious impact on migrant workers＇ employment, which is prominently manifested in their earlier return to their hometowns, the dismissal of 20 percent of migrant workers from their jobs and a considerable decline in their wages. Thanks to a series of policies the state adopted to ensure growth and expand consumption, migrant workers soon got re-employed. However, some deep-rooted problems surrounding the issue of migrant workers＇ empoyment came to light as a result of this crisis. These problems need to be solved on an urgent basis, though it will involve a considerable amount of hard work over an extended period of time. While this will require a combination of transitional measures and long-range strategies, the employment of migrant workers should also be incorporated as a fundamental part of the undertaking to ensure economic growth, adjusting the industrial structure, transforming the development mode and pushing forward with the reform.

Forecasting China's Labor Supply and Demand and the Unemployment Structure in the 13th Five-Year-Plan Period

The changes in labor supply and demand are important factors affecting economic growth.The purpose of this paper is to predict and analyze the trends in China's labor supply and demand during the 13 th Five-Year Plan period and the longer period in the future.The scale and structure of the annual new entrants of labor force are predicted by accounting the numbers who are leaving from various stages of education.while trends of labor demand are predicted according to employment elasticity from the experience of industrialization of developed countries. The results show that, during the 13 th FiveYear Plan period.the scale of the new added labor would decrease slightly, with an average annual increment of around 15.68 million. At the same time.labor demand would increase steadily, with annually 15.42 million employment opportunities. Labor supply and demand would be roughly balanced; however,there would be increasing structural contradictions of the labor market.Based on the analysis of labor supply and demand,we provide an estimation of the unemployment scale of the 40's and 50's generations,migrant workers and college graduates,and discuss policy suggestions on promoting employment of college graduates.

Current Situation and Prospects for the Urbanization of Chinese Migrant Workers

This article uses the age-structure/life-cycle method to analyze the impact of migrant workers’ employment on their urbanization. Since enterprises tend to employ younger workers and unemployed migrant workers tend to be middle-aged, we first apply the age structure/life cycle model to carry out our estimations, pointing out that in order to complete the urbanization of their families, migrant worker couples usually have to work for thirty years consecutively after marriage. On this basis, the article constructs a working life table for migrant workers and uses it to estimate the total quantity of Chinese migrant workers who have the minimum economic capacity required for urbanization. Taking into consideration future changes in the age structure of enterprise employment, we estimate that over the sixty-nine million migrant workers who were under thirty years old in 2006, together with their families, would already be in possession of the minimum economic conditions for settling in urban areas.