Welfare program participation among

rural-to-urban migrant workers

in Chinaijsw_713 10..21
Xu Q, Guan X, Yao F. Welfare program participation among
rural-to-urban migrant workers in China
Int J Soc Welfare 2011: 20: 1021 2010 The Author(s),
International Journal of Social Welfare 2010 Blackwell
Publishing Ltd and International Journal of Social Welfare.
An estimated 225 million Chinese people have migrated to
cities from Chinas rural areas over the past two decades.
These rural-to-urban migrant workers have greatly challenged
Chinas welfare system. The pre-reform welfare system was a
duel scheme with an urbanrural distinction in which rural
residents were not covered by state-run welfare programs and
had to rely on their families and rural collectives. The devel-
opment of employment-based social insurance programs in
1999 made social welfare programs available for rural-to-
urban migrant workers. Using an anonymous survey con-
ducted in seven cities across China in 2006, we found that
social insurance program participation rates were low among
rural-to-urban migrant workers. Individual factors, including
lack of knowledge of welfare programs and of a willingness to
participate, and macro-level factors, including type of
employer and industry, are critical in determining migrant
workers participation in welfare programs. Implications for
policies and practice are discussed.
Qingwen Xu
1
, Xinping Guan
2
, Fangfang Yao
3
1
Graduate School of Social Work, Boston College, MA, USA
2
Department of Social Work and Social Policy, Nankai
University, Tianjin, China
3
School of Human Service Professions, Widener University,
PA, USA
Key words: China, migrant worker, rural-to-urban migration,
welfare utilization, welfare reform
Qingwen Xu, Boston College, Graduate School of Social Work,
140 Commonwealth Avenue, Chestnut Hill, MA 02467
E-mail: xuq@bc.edu
Accepted for publication September 29, 2009
Introduction
An estimated 225 million Chinese people have
migrated to cities from Chinas rural areas for jobs over
the past two decades (National Bureau of Statistics of
China, 2009). These rural-to-urban migrant workers
have greatly challenged Chinas welfare system.
Chinas pre-reform (pre-1978) social welfare system
was a dual scheme with an urbanrural distinction, in
which most social services were targeted for urban resi-
dents; rural residents had to rely on their families and
the rural collectives to provide social services, such as
childcare and elder care. As a result of this dual system,
rural-to-urban migrant workers dwelling in cities have
fallen into a welfare Catch-22, because they were ineli-
gible for the urban welfare programs and were unable to
access their rural welfare benets. Chinas welfare
reforms over the past three decades have attempted to
diminish the urbanrural distinction and decrease
welfare inequality by developing employment-based
social insurance programs. However, migrant workers
participation in and utilization of these social welfare
programs have not been systematically documented
and studied. This article presents a study examining
Chinese rural-to-urban migrant workers use of welfare
programs and social services, and then explores the
macro-level and individual barriers to this utilization.
Chinas urbanrural distinction
Chinas household registration system (hukou), intro-
duced in 1958, created not only an urbanrural distinc-
tion, but also two classes of people. The household
registration system was a government mechanism
aimed to control the movement of its citizens within the
country (Chan & Zhang, 1999), and to distribute and
redistribute its limited resources to urban residents. Up
until 2003, without proper documents and/or employ-
ment certicates, rural people could not reside in cities,
and in some cases, those who were caught illegally
living in the cities were detained and repatriated to the
countryside (Looney, 2003). The pre-reform social
welfare system correspondingly had a clear urbanrural
distinction, in which most state-run social and health-
care services were targeted to urban residents, and the
distribution and delivery of welfare benets for urban
citizens, including healthcare, housing, pension, child-
care, etc., were linked to employers or work units,
DOI: 10.1111/j.1468-2397.2009.00713.x
Int J Soc Welfare 2011: 20: 1021
I NTERNATI ONAL
J OURNAL OF
SOCIAL WELFARE
ISSN 1369-6866
2010 The Author(s)
International Journal of Social Welfare 2010 Blackwell Publishing Ltd and the International Journal of Social Welfare.
Published by Blackwell Publishing, 9600 Garsington Road, Oxford OX4 2DQ, UK and 350 Main Street, Malden, MA 02148, USA 10
because employment was theoretically, and in actuality,
almost permanent. Rural residents did not have
employers or working units. For them, there was only
a cooperative healthcare system, which was funded by
rural collective economic organizations. It covered
limited basic healthcare; in the absence of a pension
system and comprehensive healthcare coverage, fami-
lies remained the main source for services, such as
elder care, childcare, and the various other types of care
and support (Guan, 2000; Xu & Chow, 2006).
Because of the long history of urbanrural distinc-
tion, the household registration system also continued
to maintain a bias that divided the population into mul-
tiple categories: state and collective; rural and urban
residents; agricultural producers and industrial
workers; and, with recent changes, the new category,
the traditional and the modernized. These classica-
tions also have translated into a broad distinction in
opportunities, including employment, education, and
healthcare, among others. Urban families have greater
access to university education, medical care at modern
urban hospitals, and higher-paying jobs, whereas rural
youth have underfunded schools, few chances for
advanced education, and a lack of opportunities for
upward mobility (Li et al., 2007a). With millions of
rural migrants working and living in cities today, public
disdain toward this group is growing and is exacerbated
by the loss of employment and the income insecurities
brought on by Chinas economic reforms and structural
changes. Many city governments have made efforts to
incorporate migrant workers into the urban communi-
ties and improve their wellbeing and public acceptance;
this is symbolized by the city of Chongqings recent
declaration of the rst Rural Migrant Workers Day
(Xinhua News, 2007) aimed to celebrate their contribu-
tions to the citys development. However, the long-term
effects of the urbanrural distinction cannot be easily
erased.
The surge of rural migration that started in the early
1980s was prompted primarily by the infusion of
foreign investment into China, due mainly to its cheap
labor and Chinas decision to open its doors to foreign
investment. This prompted an enormous growth and
transformation of the countrys urban economy, greatly
expanded the manufacturing sector, and increased the
need for laborers, especially cheap labor. At the same
time, the push factors that brought people from rural
areas into the cities included the increasing surplus of
agricultural labor and the growing income gap between
urban factory workers and rural farm workers (Fan,
2001; Meng, 2000). Even though factory workers are
paid low wages by Western standards, their wages far
surpass those of agricultural workers in Chinas rural
areas.
To address Chinas need for factory workers and
other laborers in its urban regions, in 1985, Chinas
central government issued the Ten Policies for Rural
Economic Development, which encouraged population
movement for economic means. Since this time, rural-
to-urban migrant workers have been permitted to work
in Chinas growing towns and cities with temporary
residence permits and without obtaining an urban
status from the household registration system. The plan
paid off. In 1978, about 28.27 million permitted
migrants were working in the cities; three decades later,
in 2008, the number had grown nearly eightfold, to 225
million (National Bureau of Statistics of China, 2009).
However, the systematic rural bias and gatekeeping has
continued to limit rural-to-urban migrant workers
equal accessibility to welfare benets and service pro-
grams. Migrant workers in China do not have equal
access to state-subsidized benets provided by public
agencies and/or their employers, and they must rely
primarily on their families for housing, healthcare,
support services, and other necessities. Their survival
in cities has been made possible by the expanding labor
market and the marketization of goods and services.
Welfare policies for migrant workers
As this huge urbanrural population shift has been
taking place in unison with Chinas economic reforms,
the pre-reform social welfare system has faced tremen-
dous challenges. In particular, it has faced pressure
from the growing number of migrant workers and their
families in need of medical services, housing, educa-
tion, and other social services. Over past decades, there
has been a growing consensus among Chinas scholars,
policymakers, and politicians that the social welfare
system is no longer compatible with its economic
reforms and the evolving societal needs that have
grown out of these changes (Guan, 2000; Wang,
2000a). Mounting internal political pressure has
prompted policymakers and central government of-
cials to initiate welfare reforms that depart from
Chinas traditional socialist model whereby every
worker and his/her family, at least for those in urban
areas, has a right to a job, basic healthcare, housing, a
pension, and social services, provided for and overseen
by the central government. In the era of reform, China
has begun transforming its social welfare system from
a wholly public enterprise into a publicprivate hybrid,
i.e. a pluralistic approach. Nevertheless, the govern-
ment has continued its provision of certain welfare ser-
vices to assure the wellbeing of urban citizens
(including the new citizens, i.e. migrant workers and
their families) in order to maintain political and social
stability (Leung, 2006).
One outcome dealing with welfare challenges in
connection with the great number of rural-to-urban
migrants is the social insurance programs created in the
late 1990s that have started to cover rural-to-urban
Welfare program participation
2010 The Author(s)
International Journal of Social Welfare 2010 Blackwell Publishing Ltd and the International Journal of Social Welfare 11
migrants working in cities in various state-run
companies and various types of corporations. The
employment-based social insurance programs include
ve detailed programs. The so-called Urban Five
include basic healthcare, basic elderly pensions, unem-
ployment insurance, occupational injury insurance
(similar to the US Workers Compensation program),
and maternity benets for working mothers. The social
insurance programs for basic healthcare, basic elderly
pensions, and unemployment insurance were estab-
lished in 1999 and require contributions from both
employers and employees. The programs for maternity
benets and occupational injury, set up in 1995 and
2003, respectively, are paid for solely by employers.
These Urban Five programs are mandatory, and
almost all types of urban organizations and corpora-
tions must adhere to the regulations and offer them,
including state-owned and urban-collective enterprises,
joint venture corporations (JVCs), and private compa-
nies that hire more than 50 workers. Different programs
have different contribution rules; for instance, for the
elderly pension fund, employers contribute 20 per cent
of their total payroll costs and employees contribute 8
per cent of their salaries; for the employee healthcare
fund, employers contribute 6 per cent of their total
payroll costs and employees contribute 2 per cent of
their salaries.
The development of the Urban Five has faced
certain challenges; a general lack of enthusiasm among
employers and extremely low participation rates have
been a concern for years. A report by Chinas Ministry
of Labor and Social Security of Peoples Republic of
China (2005) indicated that only 15 percent of migrant
workers participated in the pension program, and only
10 percent in the healthcare program. Furthermore,
most migrant workers did not enjoy any of the benets
for their maternity and occupational injuries. Thus, the
central government has made persistent efforts to
encourage migrant workers living in urban areas to
participate in the Urban Five. In 2006, the State
Council issued a comprehensive guideline in response
to criticism about migrant workers lack of rights and
the governments lack of proactive policies for enhanc-
ing the rural-to-urban migrant workers wellbeing.
These guidelines support the governments view that
migrant workers wellbeing and right to welfare ser-
vices are of great importance. The State Council
pointed to the priority of enrolling migrant workers in
the health care and occupational injury insurance pro-
grams, the necessity of lowering migrant workers
monetary contribution to the Urban Five fund, and the
consideration of migrant workers special needs in the
design of welfare programs.
While the central governments policies prescribe
only the minimal standards, principles, and guidelines,
cities have the authority to design their own programs;
consequently, there are huge variations in terms of
local policymaking and policy implementation and
enforcement. Some cities, such as Shanghai and
Chengdu, have gone beyond the Urban Fives
minimal standards and have provided comprehensive
social insurance programs for their migrant workers
(Hu, 2006). Other cities, such as Beijing and Qingdao,
are able to offer a pension program for migrant
workers that matches the benets provided for urban
residents. Still other cities are less than enthusiastic
about implementing and enforcing central government
policies because doing so, they believe, would add
cost to private enterprise and scare away investors
(Tan, 2000). It is also noted that, without addressing
the urbanrural distinction systematically, a task that
the central government has to achieve, local initiatives
that are to meet migrant workers needs in healthcare
and elderly care have become politically controversial.
For example, some cities, such as Chongqing and
Nanjing, developed very affordable local healthcare
insurance programs for migrant workers to cover the
cost of hospitalization and certain disease treatments.
As these programs cover only the current enrollment
term, there has been criticism from rural governments
where migrant workers came from, since it will be up
to the rural governments to take the tab of future
healthcare costs when migrant workers become old
and retire to their rural villages.
Local programs have been designed to meet the
challenges facing Chinas current social insurance
system; however, none of these programs can
adequately address all major issues with regard to
migrant workers special needs and the future devel-
opment of a national universal program. In 2009, the
central government proposed a revised elderly pension
program for migrant workers. The revised program
will decrease employers contribution from 20 percent
of their total payroll costs to 12 percent, and employ-
ees (i.e. migrant workers) can contribute as low as 4
percent of their salaries instead of 8 percent. Mean-
while, without a centralized system, the new program
streamlines the pension benet administration in dif-
ferent cities and provinces, and makes it easier to
transfer the benets among cities and between rural
and urban administrative systems. The 2009 proposal
is just the central governments initial response to
address the barriers that have been reported as con-
tributing to low program participation rates, such as a
high contribution rate, a segmented administra-
tion, and less exibility of benet transferability.
Nevertheless, there is a lack of empirical studies iden-
tifying the factors associated with low program par-
ticipation and welfare utilization rates, and the teasing
out of each social, structural, and behavioral factor
that could contribute to the different participation
outcomes.
Xu et al.
12
2010 The Author(s)
International Journal of Social Welfare 2010 Blackwell Publishing Ltd and the International Journal of Social Welfare
Literature review
When exploring welfare program participation and
service utilization in Western countries, Western schol-
ars frequently ask similar questions in order to better
understand migrants behavior in the social, economic,
and political context (Barrett & McCarthy, 2008). For
example: Are immigrant workers eligible to receive
social services and welfare benets? If yes, do immi-
grants use social welfare services less than their native
peers? What are the barriers for immigrants to partici-
pate in the program or use services? For rural-to-urban
migrant workers in China, while the rst question has
been addressed by the central government the Urban
Five is the answer we focused our study on exploring
the barriers for migrant workers to participate in the
programs or use the social welfare services.
The literature on international migration has exam-
ined two groups of factors that help explain immi-
grants behavior in failing to access social welfare
benets and services: (i) the cultural versus structural
factors; and (ii) pre-migration versus post-migration
factors. Scholars who have found that cultural pre-
migration factors inuence migrants use of welfare
services argue that immigrant service utilization is
largely shaped by the cultural values that immigrants
bring from their home countries or cultures of origin.
This has been particularly true for mental health service
utilization, as certain groups of immigrants are less
likely to use mental health services, even after all other
individual and structural factors are controlled for
(Leduc & Proulx, 2004; Vaga, Kolody, Aguilar-Gaxiola
& Catalano, 1999). Scholars advancing the cultural
postmigration theory similarly focus on cultural values
but emphasize the values that immigrants develop as a
result of their migration experience. For example, the
extensive service utilization among elderly Russian
immigrants was found to be due to their life circum-
stances associated with immigration, and cultural
norms and beliefs they develop based on those of the
local Russian immigrant community (Aroian,
Khatutsky, Tran & Balsam, 2001).
On the other hand, structural pre-migration theorists
postulate that differences in service utilization stem
from differences in immigrants pre-migration charac-
teristics, such as their education or English language
prociency. One study found that a low level of educa-
tion and lack of English prociency at the time of
migration correlated with low use of social services
(Jacobs, Shepard, Syaya & Stone, 2004). The structural
post-migration theorists emphasize the post-migration
experiences of different immigrant groups as being key
factors in their social service utilization. Specically,
these theorists argue that immigrants face different eco-
nomic and social opportunities and/or challenges once
they arrive in the new society, and that these different
opportunities in turn create differences in service utili-
zation, such as undocumented immigrant parents
limited use of services for their US-born children
(Berk, Schur, Chavez & Frankel, 2000).
Available literature published in English concerning
rural-to-urban migrant workers in China has focused
on migration causes (Liang, 2001), migration paths
(Rozelle et al., 1999), remittance (Taylor & Rozelle,
2003), and health and mental health (Li, Wang et al.,
2007a; Li, Zhang et al., 2007b). Limited preliminary
studies concerning welfare program participation and
service utilization have identied a few factors that
could contribute to migrant workers low participation
rate. These factors are related to the individual; for
example, migrant workers are relatively young and
healthy, and consequently have fewer needs for elder
care and healthcare (Li et al., 2007b). Some factors are
structurally oriented; for example, although migrant
workers often move frequently for jobs and opportuni-
ties, Chinas current healthcare and elderly pension
benets are territory-oriented, and most benets are not
portable (Li, 2007). Nevertheless, we lack a systematic
analysis of the reasons why millions of Chinas urban
migrant workers minimally utilize welfare programs
and services, even though these programs and services
are available to them.
Method
This study addresses the following questions: What
are the percentages of welfare program participation
among rural-to-urban migrant workers in China? What
factors contribute to their lack of welfare program
participation? And to what extent do pre- and post-
migration factors account for their welfare program
participation behavior? We adapted the cultural vs.
structural and pre- vs. post-migration framework in
order to answer these questions. This framework helps
us understand immigrants behavior from a life-course
perspective, and captures the dynamic changing nature
of personenvironment transactions. As migration is a
life transition, migrants behaviors are characterized
by both continuity and change (Hutchison, 2007).
By identifying special and unique migration-related
factors that contribute to different service use patterns
among migrants in comparison with local residents,
this framework also subscribes to an understanding that
addressing these special and unique migration-related
factors would eliminate service utilization barriers and
support the process of assimilation into the local
culture and systems (Hammarstedt, 2009).
The present study has not considered factors from
the culture perspective. Cultural factors, such as
migrant workers values and beliefs in seeking help
from the public sector in addition to their personal
networks, their values in securing their life through the
Welfare program participation
2010 The Author(s)
International Journal of Social Welfare 2010 Blackwell Publishing Ltd and the International Journal of Social Welfare 13
social welfare system instead of through their personal
resources, and their belief in their right to access ser-
vices and request them, could provide an interesting
way to understand Chinese migrant workers welfare
participation and service utilization. However, rural-to-
urban migrant workers in China are, in general, cultur-
ally homogeneous. As rural people have been excluded
from Chinas main public welfare system for several
decades, they predominately lack the understanding of
certain concepts of social welfare, are not used to
getting welfare and services from the government, and
have little knowledge about the ongoing welfare
reforms that would benet them (Wang, 2000b, 2002).
While it will be interesting to explore the patterns of
change that are due to the cultural inuence of and the
interplay between cultural and structural factors, this
study is primarily designed as an extensive examination
of structural factors affecting migrant workers welfare
participation; we leave the cultural issues for further
investigations.
Meanwhile, given the nature of Chinas rural-to-
urban migration, we in this study shared the theoretical
orientation that focuses on migrants integration
instead of assimilation (Edmonston & Passel, 1994).
Instead of talking about migrants assimilating into
mainstream Western societies, the challenge China is
facing is to integrate more than 200 million migrant
workers into cities, both economically and socially.
This integration process requires that individual
migrant workers develop and increasingly exercise their
capacities for interpersonal connectedness and urban
membership; in fact, migrant workers have gradually,
deliberately or not, changed their behaviors, percep-
tions, and perspectives in order to adapt to the new
systems and structures in cities. Simultaneously, this
integration process calls for structural changes to
address Chinas urbanrural distinction. Thus, as this
study extends the analytical focus beyond that of the
traditional Western societies, we closely examined
migrant workers service utilization behavior and its
relation to Chinas social, economic, and political
structure.
Conducting research with rural-to-urban migrant
workers in China is challenging, due to the difculty of
identifying and accessing a large nationwide migrant
sample. The data used here are from an anonymous
survey conducted in seven cities across China in the fall
of 2006. This survey was part of the China Ministry of
Educations project, Social Policy for the Transition of
Chinas Rural Labor to Urban Areas.
1
The survey ques-
tionnaire contains 11 sections, including demographics,
employment and income, employment and job training,
health and healthcare, housing, childrens education,
family background, welfare program participation,
service utilization, social activities and participation,
and migration plan, in order to comprehensively docu-
ment the rural-to-urban migrant workers life, work,
family, social activity, behavior, and perception. The
survey was administered in Chinese and generally took
about one hour to complete. The survey targeted people
registered as rural residents who were living and
working in cities at the time of the survey.
The sampling process involved a systematic
approach and a four-step scheme: (i) selection of seven
cities ve large cities, including Guangzhou (south),
Shanghai (east central), Shenyang (northeast), Tianjin
(east), and Kunming (southwest), which are either capi-
tals of provinces or chief administrative cities directly
reporting to the central government, as well as two
medium-sized cities. These seven cities are representa-
tive of Chinas diverse geographic areas. Given the
research environment in China, the sample size was set
at 500 for each large city and 250 for each medium-
sized city; (ii) identication of specic administrative
districts in each city where migrants concentrated
through using public information and labor statistics
provided by city governments; two districts in each city
were then randomly selected; (iii) random selection of
two to three companies from a list of companies that
hired migrant workers in each district; and (iv) the
recruitment of rural-to-urban migrant workers at each
company who were willing to be interviewed. In each
district, migrant workers were also recruited directly
from restaurants, hotels, markets, and other similar
small businesses that were not included in the list of
companies at step three. A total of 3,024 participants
completed the survey, including 509 from Guangzhou,
500 from Shanghai, 500 from Shenyang, 503 from
Tianjin, 497 from Kunming, and 265 and 250 partici-
pants, respectively, from the two medium-sized city.
For the purpose of this study, we examined three
groups of variables:
1 The dependent variables concern welfare program
participation. In the survey, migrant workers were
asked to answer yesno questions about their partici-
pation in the Urban Five. We were particularly
interested in analyzing their participation in the
elderly pension and healthcare programs, as these
two are the most basic programs of the Urban Five,
and the most critical for migrant workers wellbeing.
As such, dependent variables are two dichotomous
variables.
1
The project is sponsored by China Ministry of Education. Dr
Xingping Guan, professor at Nankai University Department
of Social Policy and Social Work, is the principal investigator.
The project collected both qualitative and quantitative data in
order to inform social policymaking for the wellbeing of
migrant workers. The project is signicant given Chinas
urbanrural distinction and the countrys post-reform soci-
etal goals that focus on equality, social harmony, and eco-
nomic development.
Xu et al.
14
2010 The Author(s)
International Journal of Social Welfare 2010 Blackwell Publishing Ltd and the International Journal of Social Welfare
2 Pre-migration factors include the preexisting condi-
tion of migrant workers before their migration. The
study included migrant workers demographics, i.e.
age, gender, marital status, and education level. Age
was coded in three age groups: young aged 18 to
34; mid-life aged 35 to 49; and old-age aged 50
and over. This age grouping is based on the under-
standing that many people under age 35 are still in
the process of establishing their careers in the labor
market, and many over age 49, especially women in
China, are in the process of terminating their labor
force participation (Clogg, Eliason & Leicht, 2001).
3 Post-migration factors refer to the resettling condi-
tion of migrant workers, as well as their perceptions
of and attitudes toward welfare program participa-
tion that they develop after migration. We included
macro-level factors, i.e. location/city, industry
(manufacturing, construction, service, distribution,
and non-industrial public entity), and ownership of
the workers place of employment (state-owned
enterprise and joint venture corporation, private
company and individual/small business). We also
included individual-level factors, including the sub-
jects length of stay in the city and the migrant
workers knowledge about welfare programs and
their willingness to participate.
All variables were recoded into dummy variables to
facilitate the analysis. A descriptive analysis was con-
ducted rst in order to describe the population and
document the migrant workers welfare program
participation. A bivariate analysis was performed to
identify preliminary patterns of welfare program par-
ticipation and, in particular, the different participation
patterns (or lack of difference) between the two welfare
programs. Logistic regression models were then con-
ducted to identify pre- and post-migration factors that
could contribute to migrant workers welfare program
participation.
Before presenting our results, we will discuss some
of the studys strengths and limitations. One limitation
of the present study comes from the sampling process.
Because participants were recruited primarily from
companies that hired migrant workers, the sample is
predominated by low-income, less skilled working
migrants, thereby excluding those rural-to-urban
migrants who were business owners or temporarily
unemployed. In addition, the seven cities in the study
were carefully chosen in relation to varying geographi-
cal location and level of socioeconomic development.
Nevertheless, these seven cities might not be represen-
tative of other migrant-receiving cities in China. Thus,
information derived from the survey may be less than
perfectly representative, as some individuals may have
been excluded, which limits the generalizability of the
ndings.
Furthermore, the material is self-reported, cross-
sectional data, which prevents the drawing of any
causal inferences. For example, the study cannot inves-
tigate whether migrant workers knowledge about
welfare programs is the cause of their participating in
the programs. Finally, as the survey was conducted in
2006, it does not capture the recent changes in China.
Despite these limitations, the study does have a strength
in that the large, nationwide rural-to-urban migrant
sample is likely to be as representative a sample of
migrant workers as can be obtained in China at present.
Access to such information has become available only
in recent years, and so this survey provides one of the
rst reliable glimpses into the behavior of Chinese
migrant workers.
Results
The average age of the 3,024 survey respondents was
31 years, and 64.7 percent were younger than 35 years.
Men comprised about 60.6 percent of the total sample.
More than half (54.5 percent) of the participants were
married, and 34.1 percent had children under 12 years
of age. The majority of the respondent pool (75.2
percent) had only nine years or less of education, i.e.
the education provided by Chinas pubic education
system. As for their length of stay in the city, 14.3
percent are long-term urban residents who have lived in
the city for over 10 years, and about 35 percent of the
migrant workers interviewed are recent settlers (two
years or less). Almost all the migrant workers inter-
viewed were working at the time of the survey, more
than half (53 percent) working at unskilled jobs. Over a
third of the migrant workers (35.4 percent) worked in
the service industry, and 19 percent in the construction
and manufacturing industries. In terms of type of
employer, 39 percent of the migrant workers worked for
private companies, 28.6 percent for small businesses,
and 12.7 percent for state-owned enterprises.
The social insurance program participation rates
were low, as we expected; only 11.5 percent of the
respondents participated in the urban healthcare
program, 9.1 percent in occupational injury, 8.5 percent
in the elderly pension, 3.2 percent in unemployment,
and 2.5 percent in maternity benets. In terms of the
elderly pension and healthcare programs, regard-less
of their individual- and macro-level, pre- and post-
migration characteristics, more migrant workers par-
ticipated in the healthcare program than in the elderly
pension program (see Table 1). Bivariate analysis
indicates that the most likely group to be enrolled in
both the elderly pension and the healthcare programs
were single female respondents in the young age group
(<35 years old), with more than a nine-year education
who had knowledge about these two social insurance
programs and were willing to participate in them.
Welfare program participation
2010 The Author(s)
International Journal of Social Welfare 2010 Blackwell Publishing Ltd and the International Journal of Social Welfare 15
Logistic regression models (see Tables 2 and 3)
suggest that, among pre-migration factors, gender and
education consistently predicted participation in both
elderly pension and healthcare programs. Male migrant
workers were about 30 percent less likely to enroll in
both social insurance programs than were female
migrant workers. In terms of education levels, migrant
workers with only nine years or less of education were
59.6 and 52 percent less likely to enroll in the elderly
pension and healthcare programs, respectively.
Post-migration individual-level factors had different
likelihoods of predicting participation. First, individual
knowledge about the social insurance programs and
willingness to participate were essential to the actual
participation. The more knowledge the migrant workers
had, the more likely they were to be enrolled in the
programs; workers who were willing to participate in
either the elderly care or healthcare programs were
similarly about 2.5 times more likely to have actually
participated in these two programs. While the length of
stay in cities predicted enrollment in the elderly pension
program migrant workers who stayed in cities two
years or more were 60 percent more likely to participate
than were recent migrants this factor did not predict
enrollment in the healthcare program.
Post-migration macro-level factors showed different
results in predicting the extent of participation.
Looking at the type of employer, when taking state-
owned enterprises as the benchmark, it is clear that
migrant workers in JVCs were more likely to partici-
pate in both the elderly pension and healthcare pro-
grams migrant workers were about twice as likely to
enroll in both programs. For migrants working in
private companies and small businesses, the likelihood
of participating in the healthcare program was similar
to that of their peers working in state-owned enter-
prises, but they were signicantly less likely than their
peers in state-owned enterprises to participate in the
elderly pension program.
Considering occupational differences in terms of
industry versus nonindustrial public institutions/orga-
nizations, migrant workers in the manufacturing indus-
try were signicantly more likely to participate in both
programs than were those working in nonindustrial
public institutions/organizations. In contrast, workers
in the service industry were signicantly less likely
to participate in both programs than were those
working in nonindustrial public institutions/orga-
nizations. The city in which the migrant worker lived
seems to correlate with participation in the two pro-
grams. Using one of the two medium-sized cities as the
benchmark, it appears that city size had no impact on
whether the migrant workers participated in the two
welfare programs.
Discussion
This study indicates that less than 10 percent of the
rural-to-urban migrant workers in China were partici-
pating in employment-based social insurance programs
at the time of survey, although these programs were
available to them. We found that, while pre-migration
individual factors, i.e. gender and education, explained
the difference in participation, post-migration indi-
vidual factors, i.e. lack of knowledge of welfare pro-
grams and of a willingness to participate in social
insurance programs, were the most important factors. It
is likely that lack of knowledge and lack of willingness
are mutually reinforcing. It is also notable that, as lack of
knowledge and willingness to participate predicted low
level of participation, low level of education denitely
Table 1. Participation in elderly pension and healthcare programs
(N = 3,024).
Elderly pension Healthcare
Age
Young age (<35) 9.4% 13.3%
Mid age (3549) 7.5% 8.3%
Old age (>50) 4.5% 8.0%
Gender
Male 7.4% 10.4%
Female 10.2% 13.3%
Marital status
Married 8% 9.9%
Single 9.1% 13.5%
Education
9 years or less 5.2% 7.5%
More than 9 years 18.4% 23.8%
Length of stay (mean)
Yes 69.5 months 55.7 months
No 61.5 months 63.4 months
Knowledge
Very knowledgeable 42.5% 51%
Some knowledge 20.8% 26.6%
Little knowledge 7.1% 9.4%
No knowledge 2.8% 4.5%
Willingness
Yes 14.1% 18.5%
No 3.6% 5.6%
City
1 16.4% 16.4%
2 7% 7.1%
3 12.9% 18.1%
4 2.5% 4.1%
5 5.6% 13%
6 9.2% 12%
7 4.8% 5.6%
Ownership
State-owned enterprises 11.3% 13.2%
Jointed venture companies 33.9% 41.7%
Private companies 5.6% 9.4%
Individual/small business 4.8% 6.6%
Industry
Manufacturing industry 20.2% 24.4%
Construction industry 3.6% 7.9%
Distribution industry 9.2% 9.1%
Service industry 1.9% 6.2%
Public service 17.2% 13.5%
Xu et al.
16
2010 The Author(s)
International Journal of Social Welfare 2010 Blackwell Publishing Ltd and the International Journal of Social Welfare
negatively affected the migrant workers ability to com-
prehend the details and advantages of the social insur-
ance programs, which are new concepts for Chinas
rural people, and consequently inuenced their interest
and willingness to take advantage of these programs.
It is also of great interest that women were more
likely than men to participate in welfare programs. As
China continues to some extent to be a patriarchal
society, despite the many radical changes in its recent
history, women still take a greater responsibility than
men in providing care for themselves and their families,
and play their traditional role to be the primary caregiv-
ers for their children, aged parents, and ill family
members. From this perspective, female migrant
workers might experience a pressing need and/or per-
sonal motivation to participate in the elderly pension
and healthcare programs. While some researchers have
associated the lack of willingness to participate in
social insurance programs with workers age, whereby
younger workers are thought to perceive less need to
participate in healthcare and elderly pension programs,
it is interesting to note that in the present study, the
mid-age (3549 years) and older-age (>50 years)
migrant workers did not differ from their younger peers
in welfare program participation, after controlling for
all other individual- and macro-level factors. Unlike
previous studies, the present study would seem to
invalidate the perceived needs assumption.
It is not easy to capture the whole picture of social
insurance programs for migrant workers and describe
the variation in different regions and cities. The lack of
contextual information on the cities in which the
migrant workers lived has made it difcult to interpret
the data related to post-migration factors and migrant
workers participation in the two employment-based
social insurance programs. Further study is clearly
needed. Nevertheless, we can still approximate certain
impacts of the macro-level factors on migrant workers
program participation. In fact, it is understandable that
we found differences in program participation in differ-
ent cities because, while national policies only pre-
scribe the minimal standards and principles for
receiving healthcare and pension benets, cities have
the authority to design their own programs and stan-
dards. Thus, huge variations exist between cities in
terms of local policies and policy implementation.
Table 2. Predictors of welfare program (elderly pension) participation (n = 2,616).
B SE Wald df Sig. Exp(B)
Age
Mid-age 0.192 0.218 0.775 1 0.379 1.212
Old age -0.111 0.390 0.082 1 0.775 0.895
Gender
Male -0.348 0.168 4.313 1 0.038 0.706
Marital status
Married 0.161 0.204 0.621 1 0.431 1.175
Education
9 years or less -0.906 0.170 28.384 1 0.000 0.404
Length of stay
2 years or more 0.474 0.186 6.477 1 0.011 1.607
Knowledge
Very knowledgeable 1.832 0.403 20.668 1 0.000 6.244
Some knowledge 1.160 0.225 26.569 1 0.000 3.191
Limited knowledge 0.624 0.219 8.137 1 0.004 1.866
Willingness 0.815 0.182 20.139 1 0.000 2.259
City
1 1.367 0.362 14.261 1 0.000 3.925
2 0.721 0.374 3.710 1 0.054 2.056
3 1.047 0.368 8.095 1 0.004 2.850
4 0.436 0.483 0.817 1 0.366 1.547
5 0.419 0.391 1.149 1 0.284 1.521
6 0.969 0.434 4.978 1 0.026 2.634
Ownership
Joint venture 0.720 0.263 7.519 1 0.006 2.054
Private -0.601 0.213 7.949 1 0.005 0.548
Individual -0.737 0.251 8.584 1 0.003 0.479
Industry
Manufacturing 0.700 0.221 10.043 1 0.002 2.015
Construction -0.683 0.302 5.099 1 0.024 0.505
Distribution 0.171 0.268 0.408 1 0.523 1.187
Service -1.186 0.375 10.031 1 0.002 0.305
Constant -3.723 0.466 63.922 1 0.000 0.024
df, degrees of freedom.
Welfare program participation
2010 The Author(s)
International Journal of Social Welfare 2010 Blackwell Publishing Ltd and the International Journal of Social Welfare 17
In addition, differences due to type of industry and
business structure could be the result of different levels
of regulation, administration, and policy enforcement.
While state-owned enterprises serve as a benchmark in
this study, due to their tradition of providing adequate
care and security for employees wellbeing, it is not
surprising that JVCs are doing signicantly better in
enrolling migrant workers in social insurance programs
than are the state-owned enterprises. With foreign
investment, Chinas JVCs enjoy many tax benets
and/or government subsidies; however, they are also
subject to international labor standards, as well as
Chinas social security regulations. JVCs are mandated
to provide all the social insurance programs for their
employees, and their business activities are under close
scrutiny by the Chinese government (and their home
governments if they are international organizations). In
contrast, Chinas private companies and small busi-
nesses are clearly doing poorly in securing social insur-
ance benets for their workers, primarily because it is
more difcult for the local social security administra-
tion to strictly supervise their provision of employee
social insurance programs.
As for industry, the manufacturing industrys supe-
rior participation in social insurance programs and the
service industrys below-standard participation were
expected ndings because while state-owned enter-
prises dominate the manufacturing industry, the service
industry is dominated by private, individually held
small businesses, such as restaurants and small stores.
Additionally, the participation differences between
industries also correlates with the size of the enterprise.
Smaller enterprises, such as restaurants and small
service shops, are less closely scrutinized by the gov-
ernment than are larger enterprises, and thus have lower
participation rates.
The low level of welfare program participation
among rural-to-urban migrant workers should also be
examined by evaluating the welfare programs them-
selves. The Urban Five are designed to be
employment-based contributory social insurance pro-
grams, i.e. both employers and employees contribute to
the healthcare and elderly pension funds. Requiring
employees to contribute tends to discourage some
migrant workers from participating in these social
insurance programs. This is not only because social
Table 3. Predictors of welfare program (healthcare) participation (n = 2,350).
B SE Wald df Sig. Exp(B)
Age
Mid-age -0.138 0.202 0.462 1 0.496 0.871
Old age 0.123 0.315 0.153 1 0.696 1.131
Gender
Male -0.357 0.155 5.302 1 0.021 0.700
Marital status
Married 0.173 0.184 0.882 1 0.348 1.189
Education
9 years or less -0.749 0.152 24.225 1 0.000 0.473
Length of stay
2 years and more -0.062 0.158 0.157 1 0.692 0.940
Knowledge
Very knowledgeable 2.550 0.357 50.970 1 0.000 12.803
Some knowledge 1.494 0.201 55.416 1 0.000 4.454
Limited knowledge 0.546 0.201 7.418 1 0.006 1.727
Willingness 0.892 0.160 30.931 1 0.000 2.441
City
1 1.266 0.343 13.599 1 0.000 3.547
2 0.702 0.367 3.665 1 0.056 2.018
3 1.267 0.341 13.849 1 0.000 3.551
4 0.584 0.422 1.917 1 0.166 1.794
5 1.371 0.342 16.060 1 0.000 3.941
6 1.175 0.402 8.528 1 0.003 3.237
Ownership
Joint venture 0.900 0.247 13.244 1 0.000 2.460
Private -0.182 0.188 0.935 1 0.334 0.834
Individual -0.401 0.229 3.064 1 0.080 0.670
Industry
Manufacturing 0.634 0.204 9.642 1 0.002 1.884
Construction -0.255 0.244 1.096 1 0.295 0.775
Distribution -0.286 0.266 1.160 1 0.282 0.751
Service -0.538 0.265 4.125 1 0.042 0.584
Constant -3.640 0.427 72.688 1 0.000 0.026
df, degrees of freedom.
Xu et al.
18
2010 The Author(s)
International Journal of Social Welfare 2010 Blackwell Publishing Ltd and the International Journal of Social Welfare
insurance programs are too costly for some migrant
workers, but also because the historical urbanrural
distinction has made many rural residents mistrust the
urban welfare system. In addition, employment-based
contributory social insurance programs exclude many
rural-to-urban migrants working in small businesses
from participating because of the lack of strict policy
implementation and government enforcement. Thus,
many rural-to-urban migrant workers do not have social
insurance protection, either voluntarily or involuntarily.
Chinas migrant workers are eligible to participate in
welfare programs via their employers and can access
public services offered by the urban governments that
were traditionally (for decades) reserved for urban resi-
dents only. However, as shown in the ndings of the
present study, welfare program participation is low
among current rural-to-urban migrant workers. Fur-
thermore, while making welfare programs available to
rural-to-urban migrants who lack the urban hukou and
are viewed as temporary residents of the cities symbol-
izes the granting of urban membership, their low
welfare program participation suggests a certain reluc-
tance toward having such membership. Additional
studies using qualitative data may enrich our under-
standing of migrant workers behavior in welfare
program participation. Many structural barriers still
exist in Chinas current welfare, political, and eco-
nomic systems, which makes it difcult for migrant
workers to participate in or take advantage of these
social welfare programs.
Rural-to-urban migration has contributed to Chinas
rapid economic development in recent decades by sup-
plying an undereducated, low-wage migrant workforce;
migrant workers have thus been playing an essential
and irreplaceable role in the reformed Chinese market
economy. While this does not mean that migrant
workers have become fully integrated in the cities in
economic terms (migrant workers still work predomi-
nately in low-paid, unskilled jobs, often without any
benets), their participation in Chinas urban economic
activities might suggest a moderate level of labor
market and/or economic integration. However, migrant
workers extremely low participation in welfare pro-
grams indicates that they have still not been socially
integrated into Chinas urban communities.
From the theoretical perspective of migrant integra-
tion, China clearly relies heavily on the welfare pro-
grams administered at the different levels of government
to promote integration and eliminate the urbanrural
distinction. This approach has similarities with
Swedens immigrant integration policies (Heckmann,
2004). Unfortunately, Chinas efforts have not led to a
desired level of social integration. International migra-
tion studies have pointed at the contradiction between
the economic necessity of international migration and
the existence of widespread opposition to continued
migration and migrants. This opposition is motivated by
and an expression of racism, and is the result of failed
social integration (Miles & Thranhardt, 1995).
Chinas experience indicates that opening up to
migrant workers such urban core systems as the labor
market, self-employment, education, health services,
social security, and urban membership does not auto-
matically lead to a successful social integration. The
failure to integrate rural-to-urban migrant workers eco-
nomically and socially can be attributed to the fact that
these core systems in urban communities are not fully
open to them; the discriminatory opportunity structure
still exists. Furthermore, welfare programs do not help
to increase migrant workers capacity to exercise their
urban membership, and they do not change the histori-
cal relationship between Chinas rural and urban resi-
dents. Clearly, both situations need further research.
The present study has contributed to the literature by
investigating the integration process of migrants in the
novel context of contemporary China a changed and
changing society. It has broadened the existing empiri-
cal and analytical boundaries to encompass relatively
uncharted territory.
Implications and conclusion
The present study has provided insights into Chinas
changing social welfare system stimulated by its recent
unprecedented economic growth. With the post-1978
reforms in China, the government initiated changes in
its welfare system to better serve its population, includ-
ing its underserved, or historically unserved, rural
populations, particularly the rural-to-urban migrant
population.
To increase welfare program participation among
the millions of Chinas migrant workers and to support
their social integration, the Chinese government needs
to make concrete changes in its policy and political
structure so that welfare programs will be accessible to
migrant workers and capable of meeting their needs and
those of their families. These changes include: (i) low-
ering both employers and employees contribution,
increasing governments direct investment, and offer-
ing affordable healthcare and pension rates so that low-
income migrant workers, small business owners, and
small-sized social institutions will be more likely and
able to participate; (ii) tightening government adminis-
tration and making the participation of the Urban Five
mandatory to all types of enterprises and institutions;
and (iii) providing family benets to meet the needs of
migrant workers and their families. Migrant workers
with family responsibilities can hardly be interested in
welfare programs that cover just themselves and not
their children and spouses.
The central governments proposal in 2009 is just a
start to improving current social insurance programs for
Welfare program participation
2010 The Author(s)
International Journal of Social Welfare 2010 Blackwell Publishing Ltd and the International Journal of Social Welfare 19
rural-to-urban migrant workers. In addition to moderate
policy changes, systematic efforts have to be made to
gradually eliminate the urbanrural distinction that is
so deeply rooted in society and the Chinese mindset. In
doing so, community outreach, educational programs, a
campaign to encourage migrant workers to apply for
and utilize welfare benets, and an adequate number
of social workers to help migrant workers navigate
through the complicated urban and rural welfare
systems are essential for increasing the welfare
program participation and overall wellbeing of rural-to-
urban migrant workers, as well as facilitating the
process of economic and social integration. Although
China might have, as a future perspective, a national
universal program that would cover both urban and
rural residents, such a universal program has to be
structured fundamentally differently from the countrys
pre-reform welfare system.
From Chinas experience, there are parallels in the
role of the government to improve migrants overall
wellbeing, yet there remain differences in migrant
workers welfare participation and service utilization,
given the different social, political, and economic con-
texts. The inequitable situation of Chinas rural-to-
urban migrant workers cannot be said to be comparable
with, for instance, the unfair treatment of seasonal
Mexican workers in the USA. The comparison lacks
such characteristics as national borders and state sov-
ereignty that make immigration and welfare policies in
the United States justiable. But Chinas apparent
ignoring of the plight of its rural-to-urban migrant
workers in the past is connected in a special way to the
US immigration and welfare policies that restrict immi-
grants rights, i.e. the economic conditions that cater to
a perceived need to provide an exploitable workforce,
and the political conditions that endorse social control.
Therefore, the role that the governments in both the
USA and China have played to improve migrant
workers wellbeing is more passive than proactive,
limited instead of broad, and administration-based
rather than rights-based.
Nor would it be feasible to compare the welfare
program participation of Chinas migrant workers with,
say, that of Asian immigrants in the United States.
Unlike Asian Americans, who struggle with racially
stratied social relationships and migration-associated
acculturation and assimilation issues, it is Chinas
macro-level structural factors that are the most critical
in determining rural-to-urban migrant workers welfare
program participation and service utilization. Often,
these macro-level factors offer limited options for
migrant workers. The urbanrural distinction that has
existed in China over the last four decades has pre-
vented rural residents from enjoying the privileges of
public welfare programs, such as healthcare and elderly
pension. Because of the urbanrural distinction,
migrant workers are unfamiliar with, hesitant about,
distrustful of, and reluctant to participate in the public
welfare programs available to them.
Therefore, to blame the hardworking migrant
workers for their unwillingness to participate in social
welfare programs is to blame the victims of a system
that has traditionally ignored their needs. In Chinas
ongoing movement to improve its social welfare
system, to carefully plan the growth of urban metro-
politan areas, and to promote a smooth social transition,
the social welfare policies and overarching social
systems should implement fundamental changes for the
wellbeing of all the people living and working in and
outside its cities.
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