On the Settlement of the Floating Population in the Pearl River Delta: Understanding the Factors of Permanent Settlement Intention versus Housing Purchase Actions

Abstract

Previous investigations of the settlement intentions of China’s floating population have been undermined by an oversimplification of the concepts and measurements related to settlement intentions. More attention should be paid to influencing factors from the theoretical framework of “place utility” in new periods. Based on this framework, we use a multinormal logistic regression model to explore the impact of economic, human capital, and social factors on migration intentions and housing purchase actions of the floating population in the Pearl River Delta. The results revealed that the floating population’s purchasing ability is generally lower than its willingness to settle down, and this population experiences an incomplete citizenization problem. Among the economic and human capital factors, family economic factors have become an important basis for the housing purchase actions of the floating population and may even be more important than their own economic income and education level. After the State Council implemented the “Notice of Further Promoting the Reform of the Hukou System”, the decision of whether to pass restrictions of urban hukou (household registration) acquisition threshold has played an important role in the settlement decisions of the floating population. The government should formulate settlement policies according to the characteristics of the floating population.

Beyond the Intention: Individual-Level Determinants and Intergenerational Differences of Floating Populations’ Actual Settlement Choices in Dongguan, China

“…Previous studies have demonstrated that the settlement intention is shaped by a series of socioeconomic factors [ 4 , 16 , 46 , 51 , 52 , 53 , 54 ], including household factors (e.g., family members, housing type, and household income per capita), occupational status (e.g., employed sectors, job duration, and monthly wage), and social factors (e.g., physical health, relationship with local residents, and migration experience). However, individual samples taken in this database did not contain these variables and therefore could not be taken into account for the effects of socioeconomic factors on floating populations’ actual urban settlement.…”

The Role of Housing Tenure Opportunities in the Social Integration of the Aging Pre-1970 Migrants in Beijing

“…Less attention has been paid to the role of housing types in integration. Housing provides housing security, public services, and upward mobility opportunities (such as school provisions organized around the catchment areas) for the migrants [ 31 ]. In China, hukou imposes limits on the social integration of migrants, but recent studies have indicated that the migrants tend to achieve permanent settlement through more flexible channels such as purchasing urban housing in the destination city, even though the migrants have limited housing opportunities than residents since that house prices are particularly high in big cities [ 32 , 33 ].…”

Household Registration, Land Property Rights, and Differences in Migrants’ Settlement Intentions—A Regression Analysis in the Pearl River Delta

“…In other countries, the typical migration process is that migrants permanently settle in a city after they have lived and worked there for some time. [30,31]. In China, however, many migrants are part of the floating population, residing in a certain location for a time before moving to the next, without ever settling.…”

“…Educational attainment is a critical reflection of human capital. More highly educated people face fewer challenges in economic and social integration in city life [31,52]. Specifically, educational attainment was crucial for the present rural-urban migrants, whose educational attainment was low overall.…”