IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/ecmode/v83y2019icp406-414.html

Gender imbalance in China’s marriage migration: Quantitative evidence and policy implications

Author

Listed:
  • Wang, Qingbin
  • Zou, Yang
  • Fan, Dan

Abstract

While gender-imbalanced marriage migration across borders and regions and its socioeconomic impacts have been widely reported in developing nations, this paper reports empirical findings based on data from China since 1980. China’s international marriages were characterized with more than 95% of brides from mainland China in the 1980s but the proportion has dropped gradually to around 60% in recent years. Analysis of China’s census data and a panel dataset from Shanghai suggests that proportionally more women migrated from relatively less-developed to more-developed regions through marriage and the variation in income across regions is the key factor behind the migration pattern. China’s gender-imbalanced marriage migration has caused problems such as male marriage squeeze in poor rural areas and “leftover women” in large cities like Shanghai. Policies for poverty reduction and more balanced economic development across regions are recommended for reducing such gender imbalance and the associated socioeconomic problems.

Suggested Citation

  • Wang, Qingbin & Zou, Yang & Fan, Dan, 2019. "Gender imbalance in China’s marriage migration: Quantitative evidence and policy implications," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 83(C), pages 406-414.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:ecmode:v:83:y:2019:i:c:p:406-414
    DOI: 10.1016/j.econmod.2019.09.040
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0264999318317565
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.econmod.2019.09.040?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to

    for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Du, Julan & Wang, Yongqin & Zhang, Yan, 2015. "Sex imbalance, marital matching and intra-household bargaining: Evidence from China," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 35(C), pages 197-218.
    2. Castagnetti, Carolina & Giorgetti, Maria Letizia, 2019. "Understanding the gender wage-gap differential between the public and private sectors in Italy: A quantile approach," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 78(C), pages 240-261.
    3. Quanbao Jiang & Xiaomin Li & Shuzhuo Li & Marcus W. Feldman, 2016. "China’s Marriage Squeeze: A Decomposition into Age and Sex Structure," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 127(2), pages 793-807, June.
    4. Xu, Xu & Sylwester, Kevin, 2016. "The effects of foreign direct investment on emigration: The roles of FDI source country, education, and gender," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 55(C), pages 401-409.
    5. Mark M. Pitt & Mark R. Rosenzweig & Mohammad Nazmul Hassan, 2012. "Human Capital Investment and the Gender Division of Labor in a Brawn-Based Economy," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 102(7), pages 3531-3560, December.
    6. Rosenzweig, Mark R & Stark, Oded, 1989. "Consumption Smoothing, Migration, and Marriage: Evidence from Rural India," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 97(4), pages 905-926, August.
    7. Meng, Lei & Zhao, Min Qiang, 2019. "Bride Drain: An unintended consequence of China's urban-rural divide," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 58(C), pages 69-80.
    8. Lin, Justin Yifu, 1992. "Rural Reforms and Agricultural Growth in China," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 82(1), pages 34-51, March.
    9. Baliamoune–Lutz, Mina & McGillivray, Mark, 2015. "The impact of gender inequality in education on income in Africa and the Middle East," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 47(C), pages 1-11.
    10. Leeves, Gareth.D. & Herbert, Ric., 2014. "Gender differences in social capital investment: Theory and evidence," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 37(C), pages 377-385.
    11. Christophe Guilmoto, 2012. "Skewed Sex Ratios at Birth and Future Marriage Squeeze in China and India, 2005–2100," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 49(1), pages 77-100, February.
    12. Majchrowska, Aleksandra & Strawiński, Paweł, 2018. "Impact of minimum wage increase on gender wage gap: Case of Poland," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 70(C), pages 174-185.
    13. Yoram Weiss & Junjian Yi & Junsen Zhang, 2018. "Cross†Border Marriage Costs And Marriage Behavior: Theory And Evidence," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 59(2), pages 757-784, May.
    14. Chen, Jianxian & Shao, Xiaokuai & Murtaza, Ghulam & Zhao, Zhongxiu, 2014. "Factors that influence female labor force supply in China," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 37(C), pages 485-491.
    15. Becker, Gary S, 1973. "A Theory of Marriage: Part I," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 81(4), pages 813-846, July-Aug..
    16. Lena Edlund & Hongbin Li & Junjian Yi & Junsen Zhang, 2013. "Sex Ratios and Crime: Evidence from China," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 95(5), pages 1520-1534, December.
    17. Arusha Cooray & Sushanta Mallick & Nabamita Dutta, 2014. "Gender-specific Human Capital, Openness and Growth: Exploring the Linkages for South Asia," Review of Development Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 18(1), pages 107-122, February.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Yao, Yuxin, 2017. "Essays on economics of language and family economics," Other publications TiSEM 0093bc8e-e869-4f87-8ff8-8, Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management.
    2. Ong, David & Yang, Yu (Alan) & Zhang, Junsen, 2020. "Hard to get: The scarcity of women and the competition for high-income men in urban China," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 144(C).
    3. Cheng, Yixuan & Xu, Ruozhi & Zhao, Zhong & Zou, Xianqiang, 2025. "Housing prices and spousal age gap: Evidence from the chinese housing boom," Journal of Asian Economics, Elsevier, vol. 97(C).
    4. Weiss, Yoram & Yi, Junjian & Zhang, Junsen, 2013. "Hypergamy, Cross-Boundary Marriages, and Family Behavior," IZA Discussion Papers 7293, IZA Network @ LISER.
    5. Helena Skyt Nielsen & Michael Svarer, 2009. "Educational Homogamy: How Much is Opportunities?," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 44(4).
    6. Jérôme Adda & Paolo Pinotti & Giulia Tura, 2025. "There’s More to Marriage Than Love: The Effect of Legal Status and Cultural Distance on Intermarriages and Separations," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 133(4), pages 1276-1333.
    7. Chae, Minhee & Hatton, Timothy J. & Meng, Xin, 2023. "Explaining trends in adult height in China: 1950 to 1990," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 161(C).
    8. Xiao Yu Wang, 2014. "Risk Sorting, Portfolio Choice, and Endogenous Informal Insurance," NBER Working Papers 20429, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    9. Scott South & Katherine Trent & Sunita Bose, 2014. "Skewed Sex Ratios and Criminal Victimization in India," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 51(3), pages 1019-1040, June.
    10. Nie, Haifeng & Xing, Chunbing, 2019. "Education expansion, assortative marriage, and income inequality in China," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 55(C), pages 37-51.
    11. Daiji Kawaguchi & Soohyung Lee, 2017. "Brides For Sale: Cross-Border Marriages And Female Immigration," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 55(2), pages 633-654, April.
    12. Li, Yanjun & Bai, Yu & Nakabayashi, Masaki, 2025. "Land reform and illegal adoption of children," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 53(1), pages 182-208.
    13. Kota Ogasawara & Erika Igarashi, 2021. "The Impacts of the Gender Imbalance on the Marriage Market: Evidence from World War II in Japan," Papers 2102.00687, arXiv.org, revised Dec 2024.
    14. Zhiming Cheng & Russell Smyth, 2017. "China’S Imbalanced Sex Ratio And Satisfaction With Marriage," The Singapore Economic Review (SER), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 62(04), pages 765-782, September.
    15. Elul, Ronel & Silva-Reus, Jose & Volij, Oscar, 2002. "Will you marry me?: A perspective on the gender gap," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 49(4), pages 549-572, December.
    16. Filippo Pericoli & Luigi Ventura, 2012. "Family dissolution and precautionary savings: an empirical analysis," Review of Economics of the Household, Springer, vol. 10(4), pages 573-595, December.
    17. Nii-Aponsah, Hubert, 2022. "Automation exposure and implications in advanced and developing countries across gender, age, and skills," MERIT Working Papers 2022-021, United Nations University - Maastricht Economic and Social Research Institute on Innovation and Technology (MERIT).
    18. Ong, David & Wang, Jue, 2015. "Income attraction: An online dating field experiment," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 111(C), pages 13-22.
    19. Giulia La Mattina, 2014. "Civil Conflict, Sex Ratio and Intimate Partner Violence in Rwanda," HiCN Working Papers 175, Households in Conflict Network.
    20. Anukriti, S & Dasgupta, Shatanjaya, 2017. "Marriage Markets in Developing Countries," IZA Discussion Papers 10556, IZA Network @ LISER.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    JEL classification:

    • A14 - General Economics and Teaching - - General Economics - - - Sociology of Economics
    • C5 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric Modeling
    • D1 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:ecmode:v:83:y:2019:i:c:p:406-414. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/inca/30411 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.