IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/oxf/wpaper/381.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Aspirations, Adaptation and Subjective Well-Being of Rural-Urban Migrants in China

Author

Listed:
  • John Knight
  • Ramani Gunatilaka

Abstract

This research is among the first to link the literatures on migration and on subjective well-being in developing countries. It poses the question: why do rural-urban migrant households settled in urban China have an average happiness score lower than that of rural households? It examines the hypothesis that migrants have false expectations because they cannot foresee how their aspirations will adapt to their new situation, and draws on research on both psychology and sociology. Estimated happiness functions and decomposition analyses, based on a 2002 national household survey, suggest that their high aspirations in relation to achievement, influenced by their new reference groups, make for unhappiness. The evidence is consistent with the hypothesis.

Suggested Citation

  • John Knight & Ramani Gunatilaka, 2008. "Aspirations, Adaptation and Subjective Well-Being of Rural-Urban Migrants in China," Economics Series Working Papers 381, University of Oxford, Department of Economics.
    • Handle: RePEc:oxf:wpaper:381
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://ora.ox.ac.uk/objects/uuid:cbbac5c9-3871-4202-9bae-44854bd79675
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Christopher F Baum & Mark E. Schaffer & Steven Stillman, 2003. "Instrumental variables and GMM: Estimation and testing," Stata Journal, StataCorp LP, vol. 3(1), pages 1-31, March.
    2. Easterlin, Richard A., 2006. "Life cycle happiness and its sources: Intersections of psychology, economics, and demography," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 27(4), pages 463-482, August.
    3. Matthew Rabin, 1998. "Psychology and Economics," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 36(1), pages 11-46, March.
    4. Carol Graham, 2005. "Insights on Development from the Economics of Happiness," The World Bank Research Observer, World Bank, vol. 20(2), pages 201-231.
    5. Easterlin, Richard A, 2001. "Income and Happiness: Towards an Unified Theory," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 111(473), pages 465-484, July.
    6. Knight, John & Gunatilaka, Ramani, 2010. "Great Expectations? The Subjective Well-being of Rural-Urban Migrants in China," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 38(1), pages 113-124, January.
    7. C. Graham & S. Pettinato, 2002. "Frustrated Achievers: Winners, Losers and Subjective Well-Being in New Market Economies," Journal of Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 38(4), pages 100-140.
    8. John Knight & Ramani Gunatilaka, 2010. "The Rural-Urban Divide in China: Income but Not Happiness?," Journal of Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 46(3), pages 506-534.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Ingrid Nielsen & Russell Smyth & Qingguo Zhai, 2010. "Subjective Well-Being of China’s Off-Farm Migrants," Journal of Happiness Studies, Springer, vol. 11(3), pages 315-333, June.
    2. Patricio S. Dalton & Sayantan Ghosal & Anandi Mani, 2016. "Poverty and Aspirations Failure," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 126(590), pages 165-188, February.
    3. Frijters, Paul & Liu, Amy Y.C. & Meng, Xin, 2012. "Are optimistic expectations keeping the Chinese happy?," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 81(1), pages 159-171.
    4. Rongwei Chu & Henry Hail, 2014. "Winding Road Toward the Chinese Dream: The U-shaped Relationship Between Income and Life Satisfaction Among Chinese Migrant Workers," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 118(1), pages 235-246, August.
    5. Zhiming Cheng, 2014. "Layoffs and Urban Poverty in the State-Owned Enterprise Communities in Shaanxi Province, China," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 116(1), pages 199-233, March.
    6. Shiqing Jiang & Ming Lu & Hiroshi Sato, 2009. "Happiness in the Dual Society of Urban China: Hukou Identity, Horizontal Inequality and Heterogeneous," Global COE Hi-Stat Discussion Paper Series gd08-020, Institute of Economic Research, Hitotsubashi University.
    7. Senakpon F. A. Dedehouanou & Johan Swinnen & Miet Maertens, 2013. "Does Contracting Make Farmers Happy? Evidence from Senegal," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 59, pages 138-160, October.
    8. Shaojie Qi & Hao Liu & Fengrui Hua & Xiangshu Deng & Zheng Zhou, 2022. "The Impact of Household Assets on Child Well-being: Evidence from China," Applied Research in Quality of Life, Springer;International Society for Quality-of-Life Studies, vol. 17(5), pages 2697-2720, October.
    9. Guriev, Sergei & Zhuravskaya, Ekaterina & Frijters, Paul & Liuy, Amy Y.C. & Mengz, Xin, 2009. "Happiness in transition countries [2 articles]," CEPREMAP Working Papers (Docweb) 0902, CEPREMAP.
    10. Dedehouanou, Senakpon & Maertens, Miet, 2011. "Participation in Modern Agri-Food Supply Chain in Senegal and Happiness," 2011 International Congress, August 30-September 2, 2011, Zurich, Switzerland 114447, European Association of Agricultural Economists.
    11. Karsten von Kleist, 2010. "Migrant happiness in China," Journal of Chinese Economic and Business Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 8(2), pages 157-166.
    12. Guillen-Royo, Monica, 2011. "Reference group consumption and the subjective wellbeing of the poor in Peru," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 32(2), pages 259-272, March.
    13. Jia Wang, 2017. "Rural-to-urban Migration and Rising Evaluation Standards for Subjective Social Status in Contemporary China," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 134(3), pages 1113-1134, December.

    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. KNIGHT, John & SONG, Lina & GUNATILAKA, Ramani, 2009. "Subjective well-being and its determinants in rural China," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 20(4), pages 635-649, December.
    2. Knight, John & Gunatilaka, Ramani, 2010. "Great Expectations? The Subjective Well-being of Rural-Urban Migrants in China," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 38(1), pages 113-124, January.
    3. Frijters, Paul & Liu, Amy Y.C. & Meng, Xin, 2012. "Are optimistic expectations keeping the Chinese happy?," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 81(1), pages 159-171.
    4. Akay, Alpaslan & Bargain, Olivier & Zimmermann, Klaus F., 2012. "Relative concerns of rural-to-urban migrants in China," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 81(2), pages 421-441.
    5. Knight, John & Gunatilaka, Ramani, 2012. "Income, aspirations and the Hedonic Treadmill in a poor society," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 82(1), pages 67-81.
    6. Thomas Markussen & Maria Fibæk & Finn Tarp & Nguyen Do Anh Tuan, 2018. "The Happy Farmer: Self-Employment and Subjective Well-Being in Rural Vietnam," Journal of Happiness Studies, Springer, vol. 19(6), pages 1613-1636, August.
    7. Van Landeghem, Bert & Vandeplas, Anneleen, 2018. "The relationship between status and happiness: Evidence from the caste system in rural India," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 77(C), pages 62-71.
    8. Chang Wen-Chun, 2008. "Toward Independence or Unification?," Peace Economics, Peace Science, and Public Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 13(2), pages 124-153, January.
    9. Clark, Andrew E. & Senik, Claudia, 2010. "Will GDP Growth Increase Happiness in Developing Countries?," CEPREMAP Working Papers (Docweb) 1024, CEPREMAP.
    10. Hania Wu & Tony Tam, 2015. "Economic Development and Socioeconomic Inequality of Well-Being: A Cross-Sectional Time-Series Analysis of Urban China, 2003–2011," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 124(2), pages 401-425, November.
    11. Sarracino, Francesco, 2013. "Determinants of subjective well-being in high and low income countries: Do happiness equations differ across countries?," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 42(C), pages 51-66.
    12. Easterlin, Richard A. & Angelescu, Laura & Zweig, Jacqueline S., 2011. "The Impact of Modern Economic Growth on Urban–Rural Differences in Subjective Well-Being," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 39(12), pages 2187-2198.
    13. Guven, Cahit, 2012. "Reversing the question: Does happiness affect consumption and savings behavior?," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 33(4), pages 701-717.
    14. David Alexander Clark, 2011. "Adaptation and development: issues, evidence and policy relevance," Global Development Institute Working Paper Series 15911, GDI, The University of Manchester.
    15. Chu Li & Jinming Yan & Ze Xu, 2021. "How Does New-Type Urbanization Affect the Subjective Well-Being of Urban and Rural Residents? Evidence from 28 Provinces of China," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(23), pages 1-17, November.
    16. Thomas Markussen & Maria Fibæk & Finn Tarp & Nguyen Do Anh Tuan, 2018. "The Happy Farmer: Self-Employment and Subjective Well-Being in Rural Vietnam," Journal of Happiness Studies, Springer, vol. 19(6), pages 1613-1636, August.
    17. Knight, John & Gunatilaka, Ramani, 2022. "Income inequality and happiness: Which inequalities matter in China?," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 72(C).
    18. Graham, Carol & Nikolova, Milena, 2013. "Does access to information technology make people happier? Insights from well-being surveys from around the world," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 44(C), pages 126-139.
    19. Brian Chi-ang Lin & Siqi Zheng & Eleftherios Giovanis & Oznur Ozdamar, 2016. "Structural Equation Modelling And The Causal Effect Of Permanent Income On Life Satisfaction: The Case Of Air Pollution Valuation In Switzerland," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 30(3), pages 430-459, July.
    20. Wang-Sheng Lee & Zhong Zhao, 2017. "Height, Weight and Well-Being for Rural, Urban and Migrant Workers in China," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 132(1), pages 117-136, May.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Rural-Urban Migration; Subjective Well-Being; Happiness; Relative Deprivation; Aspirations; China;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • I32 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Welfare, Well-Being, and Poverty - - - Measurement and Analysis of Poverty
    • O15 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Economic Development: Human Resources; Human Development; Income Distribution; Migration

    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:oxf:wpaper:381. 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: Anne Pouliquen (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/sfeixuk.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.