Economic reforms and gender inequality in Urban China

Abstract

A study was conducted using a Chinese longitudinal data set, the China Health and Nutrition Survey, to examine the evolution of the gender earnings gap between 1989 and 2004. Consistent with the decomposition results, our analyses on employment retention rate also suggest that better-educated workers and those with a higher level of unobserved skills have a higher probability of being employed over two consecutive surveys in the later reform period. Employers had little control over whom they could employ and how much to pay. The first step taken by the government to increase labor market flexibility is the reintroduction of bonuses and piece wages in 1978. Within each province, its urban sample covers the provincial capital city and a lower income city when feasible. In two provinces, the survey has to use other larger cities rather than the provincial capitals.