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Given its significant implications for the economy and society, this paper investigates the impact of housing supply regulation on household wealth inequality. Utilizing data from the China Household Finance Survey and land transaction records spanning from 2013 to 2019, we employ recentered influence function regression and two-way fixed effects models to analyze the effect of unexpected housing supply shocks on the wealth gap among households. Our findings reveal that positive unexpected housing supply shocks are crucial in reducing household wealth inequality. This reduction is attributed to the heterogeneous impacts of housing supply regulation on different wealth groups. By deregulating the housing supply, the upward trend in housing prices has slowed, which in turn makes homeownership more accessible and facilitates wealth accumulation for households that fall within the 20 % and 80 % wealth quantiles. Conversely, deregulation has a negative impact on property values for households in the 80–100 % wealth quantile, thus mitigating their overall wealth growth. Overall, this study emphasizes the significant role of housing supply regulation in shaping wealth inequality in China. • This paper examines the housing supply regulation's impact on wealth inequality in China. • Positive housing supply shocks play a vital role in decreasing household wealth inequality. • Deregulation boosts homeownership for 20 %–80 % wealth quantile households. • Wealthiest households face property value drops with deregulation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although migrant labor shortages have affected migrant-receiving areas in Eastern China for many years, research shows that there is still an abundance of laborers in rural China. Therefore, the dynamics that undermine the out-migration of rural laborers in migrant-sending areas is a critical factor in the pace of China's urbanization process. Public policies promulgated by the central government focus on institutional reform, such as offering urban hukou 3 3 Also known as the household registration system, the hukou assigns citizens rural status (rural or agricultural hukou ) or urban status (urban or non-agricultural hukou ) in de jure terms. to rural migrants. Still, the decision-making processes of rural villagers and potential migrants remain unclear. Based on a case study of 32 townships in Nanyang, and further investigation in nine migrant-sending provinces, this paper probes into the livelihood strategies of rural households, rather than accepting the current conclusions of many Western research models. Preliminary findings reveal that rural livelihood strategies are undermining further out-migration of rural laborers in migrant-sending areas in three ways: 1) income diversification strategies that reflect emerging local off-farm job opportunities; 2) peri-urbanization driven by rural hukou that rural residents find increasingly attractive compared to urban hukou ; and 3) localized urbanization driven by rural industrialization, better public services and rural residents' desire to keep families intact. These findings differ from previous explanations of the coexistence of migrant labor shortages and an abundant rural labor supply. Most importantly, they suggest that opening urban hukou entitlement will not promote further rural-to-urban migration per se to the extent that is generally assumed, unless a more coordinated rural–urban development model can be achieved to change rural household livelihood diversification strategies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Over the last several decades an on-going interest by academics in studies of intra- and inter-personal relationships has revealed complex and dynamic decision-making mechanisms within households. However, previous research has mainly focused on the relationship between partners/spouses in households of couples and/or nuclear families. The intra-household dynamics in household contexts other than couples/spouses and inter-personal relations in these other households remain largely unknown. This paper is therefore dedicated to investigating the intra- and inter-personal interactions of partners/spouses and inter-personal interactions between different generations in elderly co-residence households. Using data from the Nanjing Residents Travel Survey 2012, an asymmetric structure is observed among the interactions between young females and males: males' activity participation is more strongly affected by females' activity engagement than the reverse. The presence of an elderly mother or mother-in-law tends to reduce the interdependence of intra- and inter-personal interactions for both young couples. It is interesting to find that a young female's activities are more determined by her elderly mother in the extended family than her husband. The influence of a young spouse on an old mother's activity participation is also gender-specific. Implications of these findings for public policies are also discussed at the end of the paper. • Males' activity participation is more strongly affected by that of females than the reverse • The presence of a mother leads to less radeoffs between activities of both spouses • Female's activities are more determined by her mother in the extended family than her husband • The influence of a young spouse on an old mother's activity participation is gender-specific [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

China is a country of homeowners, where >80% of households own their homes and >20% of urban households own multiple homes. China achieved this unprecedented high rate home ownership in a short period of three decades. While we have a growing understanding of homeownership in general we are less clear about the process and outcomes of multiple home ownership in China. This paper examines the patterns of and driving forces for multiple home ownership, and explores the implications for housing inequality in Chinese cities. While socio-economic factors appear critical in China as is the case in the West, we argue for an institutional and cultural perspective to better understand multiple home ownership in China. The empirical analyses using 2015 China Household Finance Survey show that households who received housing subsidies, have urban registration, experienced demolition and resettlement, have school age children attending key schools, and have sons are more likely to own multiple homes. By focusing on the institutional and cultural forces, this paper better explains the unprecedented high rate of multiple homeownership in Chinese cities, and demonstrates how various housing policies in China have unintentionally contributed to multiple homeownership and thus housing and wealth inequality. • Multiple home ownership rate is unprecedented high in Chinese cities • Institutional and cultural factors together with sociodemographic forces drive multiple home ownership in China • Housing subsidies and resettlement promote multiple home ownership • Rural migrant are less while urban migrant are more likely to own multiple homes than local urban homeowners • Having children attending key schools and having sons encourage multiple homes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Given the central role of households in motivating and implementing migration, this paper argues that the "householding" and split-household approaches are fundamental and essential for migration research, by drawing from original research on rural-urban migrants in China and four published studies on Asian migrants. Translocality and household-splitting that enable the earning of remittances or help meet other family goals such as children's education, set in motion processes of gender and intergenerational divisions of labor that involve both the migrants and the left-behind, and have implications for urban development in large cities as well as cities near rural areas. Hundreds of millions of rural migrants in China circulate between their home villages and host cities, and large numbers of women from Southeast Asia work overseas. Likewise, skilled migrants from South Asia and East Asia maintain transnational households that straddle their home and host countries. Household biographies and interviewees' narratives from these examples highlight two strategies of migrants and their family members: their flexibility and frequent changes of location, work, activity, and household arrangement; and their reinventing women's and men's responsibilities without challenging traditional gender ideology. These stories underscore the importance of householding and split-households for informing contemporary migration theories and research. • Both international and internal migrants pursue "householding" and split-household strategies. • Both migrants to cities and the left-behind contribute to sustaining and maintaining the split households. • Members of split households change frequently their location, work, and household arrangement. • Migrants and the left-behind reinvent their family responsibilities vis-à-vis gender norms. • Experiences of Asian migrants to cities are important for migration theories and research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Households often make errors in assessing homevalue. By merging representative Chinese urban household survey data with web-scraped housing price data, we estimate a hedonic model to assess the real value of homes and calculate the extent of homevalue misestimation. We show that homevalue misestimation is significantly related to household leverage: a 10% increase in the extent of homevalue misestimation is associated with a 1.88 percentage increase in household leverage, in terms of debt-to-income ratios. Moreover, both formal and informal borrowing are increasing with respect to homevalue misestimation. A variety of robustness checks and heterogeneity analyses further support our main results. The correlation between misestimation and leverage is even larger for households who underestimate their homevalue. It's demonstrated that the lack of housing market information and endowment effect both contribute to misestimation. However, there is no evidence that overconfidence, risk attitude, or anchoring effect significantly affect misestimation. These findings have policy implications for the recent debate on property taxes, indicating the unexpected consequences of property taxes by providing more precise information on homevalue. • Households often substantially overestimate their homevalue. • Using a national representative sample, this paper studies the impact of homevalue misestimation on household leverage in China. • A 10% increase in homevalue misestimation is associated with a 1.88 percentage increase in household leverage • Endowment effect and the access to market information are important reasons underlying misestimations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

China is facing great challenges in providing decent living conditions for the elderly. The effects of housing wealth and the social welfare system on elderly households' consumption behaviors have been widely explored, but little is known about the heterogeneous effects of various wealth sources on consumptions of different economic groups of the elderly. Taking into account regional differences, this paper investigated the extent to which housing wealth, financial wealth, and social welfare influence the consumption behaviors of the elderly of various economic status. We employed the linear mixed model estimation and quantile regression by using the China Household Finance Survey data collected from 2011 to 2015. Results showed that a large urban–rural gap exists between the eastern, central, and western regions of China. Housing wealth exerts limited effects on the urban elderly households' consumption behaviors but has significant positive effects on the rural elderly households' consumption. The financial wealth and pension may offset part of the consumption inequality generated from annual household income. An increasing pension contributes more to medical and health care consumption for the poor households. Policymakers need to enhance the social welfare system to take care of the most vulnerable elderly group in the first place. • Housing wealth has limited effects on the urban elderly's consumption but significant positive effects on the rural elderly. • The financial wealth and pension may offset part of the consumption inequality generated from annual household income. • An increasing pension contributes more to medical and health care consumption for the poor households. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]