The Distribution Of Wealth In Rural China

Based on an analysis of a 1988 nationwide sample survey of 10,258 households, this book aims to offer insights into issues of rural inequality in China. The work focuses on the study of wealth rather than income as the primary measure.

This study focuses on China's rural industries, offering a theoretical framework to explain institutional change.

The Chinese economy's return to commodification and privatization has greatly diversified China's institutional landscape. With the migration of more than 140 million villagers to cities and rapid urbanization of rural settlements, it is no longer possible to presume that the nation can be divided into strictly urban or rural classifications. Creating Wealth and Poverty in Postsocialist China draws on a wide variety of recent national surveys and detailed case studies to capture the diversity of postsocialist China and identify the contradictory dynamics forging contemporary social stratification. Focusing on economic inequality, social stratification, power relations, and everyday life chances, the volume provides an overview of postsocialist class order and contributes to current debates over the forces driving global inequalities. This book will be a must read for those interested in social inequality, stratification, class formation, postsocialist transformations, and China and Asian studies.

Based on original data obtained from a purpose-designed nationwide household sample survey, the volume contains studies of the overall distribution of income, inequality and poverty in rural areas, wage employment in rural industries, urban wage inequalities, and the relationship between education and income. An appendix describes the household sample survey.