Persistent productivity gains to rural-urban migrants have been documented by a number of researchers. One interpretation of this result is that individuals learn higher value skills in cities than they would have learned in less dense areas. Another explanation for this result, however, is that...

The paper studies the dynamic change of the migrant labor market in China from 2002 to 2007 using two comparable data sets. Our focus is on the rural-urban migration decision, the wage structure of migrants, the urban labor market segmentation between migrants and urban natives, and the changes...

Rural elderly have 40% of the income of those in urban areas, spend a larger share of their income on food, are in worse health, work later into their lives, and depend more on their children, lacking pensions and public services. The birth quota since 1980 has particularly restricted the...