IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/eti/dpaper/16021.html

Employment and Starting Wages of New Graduates in China: Using the latest available survey data

Author

Listed:
  • Yang LIU

Abstract

We examined the determinants of labor market outcomes of new graduates in China based on an original survey. Data were collected in recent years following the new reform of the household registration system ( hukou in the literature). We found that search effort, measured by the number of job applications sent by graduates, has a significant positive effect on employment. Furthermore, parents' income contributes significantly to starting wage, but has no significant effect on finding a job. This could be because parents' income is considered a major unemployment benefit for new graduates, theoretically contributing to wages but not affecting job-labor match. Moreover, contrary to previous studies using data before the new hukou reform, there was no significant wage gap between urban-born and rural-born graduates in our sample. Even though parents' income of rural-born graduates is much lower than that of urban-born graduates, the results suggest a significant advantage for the former compared to the latter in the labor market. We argue this could be the result of China's hukou -based university admissions system, which sets starkly different qualifying scores for different birthplaces, and, thus, the quality of students at the same university could differ by birthplace.

Suggested Citation

  • Yang LIU, 2016. "Employment and Starting Wages of New Graduates in China: Using the latest available survey data," Discussion papers 16021, Research Institute of Economy, Trade and Industry (RIETI).
    • Handle: RePEc:eti:dpaper:16021
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.rieti.go.jp/jp/publications/dp/16e021.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Pissarides, C A, 1979. "Job Matchings with State Employment Agencies and Random Search," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 89(356), pages 818-833, December.
    2. Zhong, Hai, 2011. "Returns to higher education in China: What is the role of college quality?," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 22(2), pages 260-275, June.
    3. Kuhn, Peter J. & Shen, Kailing, 2014. "Do Employers Prefer Undocumented Workers? Evidence from China's Hukou System," IZA Discussion Papers 8289, IZA Network @ LISER.
    4. Try, Sverre, 2005. "The use of job search strategies among university graduates," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 34(2), pages 223-243, March.
    5. Bai, Chong-en & Chi, Wei & Qian, Xiaoye, 2014. "Do college entrance examination scores predict undergraduate GPAs? A tale of two universities," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 30(C), pages 632-647.
    6. Pierre Cahuc & André Zylberberg, 2004. "Labor Economics," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 026203316x, December.
    7. Christopher A. Pissarides, 2000. "Equilibrium Unemployment Theory, 2nd Edition," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 0262161877, December.
    8. John T. Addison & Pedro Portugal, 2002. "Job search methods and outcomes," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 54(3), pages 505-533, July.
    9. Bratberg, Espen & Nilsen, Øivind Anti, 1998. "Transition from School to Work: Search Time and Job Duration," IZA Discussion Papers 27, IZA Network @ LISER.
    10. Li, Tao & Zhang, Juyan, 2010. "What determines employment opportunity for college graduates in China after higher education reform?," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 21(1), pages 38-50, March.
    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. Yang Liu, 2017. "Job Search and Labor Market Outcomes of New Graduates in China: Using the Latest Available Survey Data," Review of Economics & Finance, Better Advances Press, Canada, vol. 7, pages 66-79, February.
    2. Etienne Campens & Solenne Tanguy, 2006. "The market for job placement: a model of headhunters," Post-Print halshs-00113476, HAL.
    3. Etienne Campens & Solenne Tanguy, 2005. "The market for job placement : a model of head-hunters," Cahiers de la Maison des Sciences Economiques v06027, Université Panthéon-Sorbonne (Paris 1).
    4. Ronald Bachmann & Daniel Baumgarten, 2013. "How do the unemployed search for a job? – Evidence from the EU Labour Force Survey," IZA Journal of European Labor Studies, Springer;Forschungsinstitut zur Zukunft der Arbeit GmbH (IZA), vol. 2(1), pages 1-25, December.
    5. Gavrel, Frédéric & Lebon, Isabelle, 2009. "Endogenous job specialization," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 26(2), pages 328-334, March.
    6. L'Haridon, Olivier & Malherbet, Franck, 2009. "Employment protection reform in search economies," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 53(3), pages 255-273, April.
    7. Friese, Max, 2015. "The labor market effect of demographic change: Alleviation for financing social security," Thuenen-Series of Applied Economic Theory 138 [rev.], University of Rostock, Institute of Economics.
    8. Liu, Yang, 2013. "Labor market matching and unemployment in urban China," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 24(C), pages 108-128.
    9. Martina Rebien & Michael Stops & Anna Zaharieva, 2020. "Formal Search And Referrals From A Firm'S Perspective," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 61(4), pages 1679-1748, November.
    10. Christopher Opoku Nyarko & William Baah-Boateng & Edward Nketiah-Amponsah, 2014. "Determinants of Job Search Intensity in Ghana," Margin: The Journal of Applied Economic Research, National Council of Applied Economic Research, vol. 8(2), pages 193-211, May.
    11. Konstantinos Tatsiramos & Jan C. Ours, 2014. "Labor Market Effects Of Unemployment Insurance Design," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 28(2), pages 284-311, April.
    12. Thomas Ziesemer, 2003. "Information and Communication Technology as Technical Change in Matching and Production," Journal of Economics, Springer, vol. 79(3), pages 263-287, July.
    13. Pierre Cahuc & François Fontaine, 2009. "On the Efficiency of Job Search with Social Networks," Journal of Public Economic Theory, Association for Public Economic Theory, vol. 11(3), pages 411-439, June.
    14. Smith, Tony E. & Zenou, Yves, 2003. "Spatial mismatch, search effort, and urban spatial structure," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 54(1), pages 129-156, July.
    15. Anthony E. Smith & Yves Zenou, 2003. "A Discrete-Time Stochastic Model of Job Matching," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 6(1), pages 54-79, January.
    16. Kennes, John & le Maire, Daniel & Roelsgaard, Sebastian T., 2020. "Equivalence of canonical matching models," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 124(C), pages 169-182.
    17. Gavrel, Frédéric & Lebon, Isabelle & Rebière, Thérèse, 2010. "Wages, selectivity, and vacancies: Evaluating the short-term and long-term impact of the minimum wage on unemployment," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 27(5), pages 1274-1281, September.
    18. Cahuc, Pierre & Le Barbanchon, Thomas, 2010. "Labor market policy evaluation in equilibrium: Some lessons of the job search and matching model," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 17(1), pages 196-205, January.
    19. Semih Tumen, 2016. "Informal versus formal search: Which yields better pay?," International Journal of Economic Theory, The International Society for Economic Theory, vol. 12(3), pages 257-277, September.
    20. Salvatori, Andrea, 2010. "Labour contract regulations and workers' wellbeing: International longitudinal evidence," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 17(4), pages 667-678, August.

    More about this item

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:eti:dpaper:16021. 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: TANIMOTO, Toko (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/rietijp.html .

    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.