Title

CIIDWPNo.54-Gao et al=social Policy and economic distances 2002-2013

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2016/11/30 20:59:20

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struggle12

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Introduction

Using the China Household income Project (CHIP) 2002, 2007, and 2013 data, this chapter examines the effects of a series of social policy reforms on the economic distances between the poor and the rich in urban, rural, and migrant families during this period. We find that, in urban areas, pensions helped narrow the economic distances consistently over the years, while other social benefits—including health insurance, social assistance, supplementary income, and in-kind benefits—had little or no redistributive impact. Both rural and migrant social benefits turned from being regressive in 2002 to progressive in 2013. In rural areas, supplementary income and in-kind benefits in the form of agricultural and livelihood subsidies played the most significant redistributive role among the social benefits in 2013, while private transfers also helped narrow the economic distances substantially. For migrants, health benefits and taxes and fees helped narrow the economic distances in 2013, despite to a smaller extent as compared to the rural social benefits. Despite the social policy expansions during this period, in both urban and rural China, market forces still played the dominant role in widening the economic distances between the poor and rich, which trumped the redistributive effects of the social benefits. These results suggest that China’s future social policy reforms face continued challenges in unifying the unbalanced urban-rural-migrant systems and keeping pace with the disequalizing market forces.

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