In Search of a Better Life The Occupational Attainment of Rural and Urban Migrants in China

This article investigates the occupational attainment and job mobility of permanent rural-to-urban migrants and compares them with migrants who were born with an urban hukou. We examine how much of the gap in occupational-prestige scores between rural-to-urban and urban-to-urban migrants can be explained by differences in observable characteristics up to the time of migration. With controls for these characteristics, the difference in occupational attainment between rural and urban migrants becomes statistically insignificant or even positive for some subgroups. In contrast, job mobility analysis reveals that rural migrants are generally more mobile and also more likely to move to better jobs by changing work units, whereas urban migrants are more likely to be promoted within a work unit.