A China Paradox: Migrant Labor Shortage amidst Rural Labor Supply Abundance

In March 1922, with spring planting imminent, the Agricultural Chamber of the Saxon Freestate surveyed 790 local agricultural associations, seeking information on the character and dimensions of the rural labor shortage. 640 reports were returned within six weeks, signaling Saxon farmers' desperation to be heard. According to their estimates, Saxon agriculture lacked a minimum of 7,834 men and 11,164 women, or just under 19,000 workers. Despite the substantial number of men needed, farmers overwhelmingly bemoaned the lack of young, single women willing and able to work in Saxon agriculture, and warned of dire consequences for both agricultural producers and the general public if the crisis were not resolved. Indeed, small and medium-sized Saxon farmers' testimonies about the postwar labor shortage linked agriculture's potential for recovery to the preservation of prewar gender divisions of labor, and drew an absolute correlation between the postwar shortage of women's labor and the impending ruin of family farms.

Download Full-text

Rural Roots of Current Migrant Labor Shortage in China: Development and Labor Empowerment in a Situation of Incomplete Proletarianization

Studies in Comparative International Development ◽

10.1007/s12116-012-9124-5 ◽

2012 ◽

Vol 48 (1) ◽

pp. 81-111 ◽

Cited By ~ 26

Author(s):

Shaohua Zhan ◽

Lingli Huang

Keyword(s):

Migrant Labor ◽

Labor Shortage ◽

China Development

Download Full-text

Too Few Skills for Some, Too Many Skills for Others: Are Future Rural Employment Opportunities a Poor Match for the Rural Labor Supply?

Career and Technical Education Research ◽

10.5328/cter42.2.79 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 42 (2) ◽

pp. 79-101

Author(s):

Daniel C. Eades ◽

David W. Hughes

Keyword(s):

Labor Supply ◽

Employment Opportunities ◽

Rural Labor ◽

Rural Employment

Download Full-text

CREAM-SKIMMER OR UNDERDOG? A CASE STUDY OF LABOR TYPE SELECTIVITY IN A RURAL LABOR TRAINING PROGRAM IN CHINA

The Singapore Economic Review ◽

10.1142/s021759082044004x ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 65 (supp01) ◽

pp. 185-210

Author(s):

YIU POR (VINCENT) CHEN

Keyword(s):

Labor Supply ◽

Training Program ◽

Rural Population ◽

Opportunity Cost ◽

Training Programs ◽

Rural Labor ◽

Labor Training ◽

Cream Skimming ◽

Clear Method

The mismatch between a laborer’s abilities and the goals set forth by a training program is one of the most pressing concerns for a labor training program. This paper looks at the incentives for a laborer to enter a rural labor training program and demonstrates a clear method of analyzing the participation issues using instrumental regressions on the data collected from a case study a “poverty city” in the Zhejiang province, China. This paper shows that a pre-program wage drop may induce workers of a higher caliber to enter the training program and cause a “cream-skimming” effect on its outcome because of the S-shaped labor supply curve for the rural population who live in poverty. The result of the cream-skimming effect enhances the traditional view that a pre-program wage drop may reduce “opportunity cost” to enter a training program. This extension can be handy to revise future designs of rural labor training programs.

Download Full-text