IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/nbr/nberwo/19254.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

How Does China's New Labor Contract Law Affect Floating Workers?

Author

Listed:
  • Richard B. Freeman
  • Xiaoying Li

Abstract

China's new Labor Contract Law took effect on January 2008 and required firms to give migrant workers written contracts, strengthened labor protections for workers and contained penalties for firms that did not follow the labor code. This paper uses survey data of migrant workers in the Pearl River Delta before and after the law and a retrospective question on when workers received their first labor contract to assess the effects of the law on labor outcomes. The evidence shows that the new law increased the percentage of migrant workers with written contracts, which in turn raised social insurance coverage, reduced the likelihood of wage arrears, and raised the likelihood that the worker had a union at their workplace.

Suggested Citation

  • Richard B. Freeman & Xiaoying Li, 2013. "How Does China's New Labor Contract Law Affect Floating Workers?," NBER Working Papers 19254, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    • Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:19254
    Note: LE LS
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.nber.org/papers/w19254.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Mary Elizabeth Gallagher, 2007. "Introduction to Contagious Capitalism: Globalization and the Politics of Labor in China," Introductory Chapters, in: Contagious Capitalism: Globalization and the Politics of Labor in China, Princeton University Press.
    2. Chen, Yu-Fu & Funke, Michael, 2009. "China's new Labour Contract Law: No harm to employment?," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 20(3), pages 558-572, September.
    3. Blau, Francine D. & Kahn, Lawrence M., 1999. "Institutions and laws in the labor market," Handbook of Labor Economics, in: O. Ashenfelter & D. Card (ed.), Handbook of Labor Economics, edition 1, volume 3, chapter 25, pages 1399-1461, Elsevier.
    4. repec:zbw:bofitp:2008_029 is not listed on IDEAS
    5. Chen, Yu-Fu & Funke, Michael, 2008. "China´s new labour contract law: no harm to employment?," SIRE Discussion Papers 2008-51, Scottish Institute for Research in Economics (SIRE).
    6. Rebecca M. Blank, 1994. "Introduction to "Social Protection versus Economic Flexibility: Is There a Trade-Off?"," NBER Chapters, in: Social Protection versus Economic Flexibility: Is There a Trade-Off?, pages 1-20, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    7. Justin Yifu Lin, 1989. "An Economic Theory of Institutional Change: Induced and Imposed Change," Cato Journal, Cato Journal, Cato Institute, vol. 9(1), pages 1-33, Spring/Su.
    8. Rebecca M. Blank, 1994. "Social Protection versus Economic Flexibility: Is There a Trade-Off?," NBER Books, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc, number blan94-1, June.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. MacLeod, W. Bentley, 2011. "Great Expectations: Law, Employment Contracts, and Labor Market Performance," Handbook of Labor Economics, in: O. Ashenfelter & D. Card (ed.), Handbook of Labor Economics, edition 1, volume 4, chapter 18, pages 1591-1696, Elsevier.
    2. David Kucera, 1998. "Unemployment and External and Internal Labor Market Flexibility: A Comparative View of Europe, Japan, and the United States," SCEPA working paper series. 1998-21, Schwartz Center for Economic Policy Analysis (SCEPA), The New School.
    3. Asma Hyder & Barry Reilly, 2005. "The Public and Private Sector Pay Gap in Pakistan: A Quantile Regression Analysis," The Pakistan Development Review, Pakistan Institute of Development Economics, vol. 44(3), pages 271-306.
    4. Richard B.Freeman, 2003. "Labor market institutions and employment policies: the international experience," Estudios de Economia, University of Chile, Department of Economics, vol. 30(1 Year 20), pages 5-20, June.
    5. Adeola F. Adenikinju & Olugboyega Oyeranti, 1999. "Characteristics and Behaviour of African Factor Markets and Market Institutions and Their Consequences for Economic Growth," CID Working Papers 31A, Center for International Development at Harvard University.
    6. Fischer, Justina A.V., 2012. "The choice of domestic policies in a globalized economy," Papers 306, World Trade Institute.
    7. Horst Feldmann, 2003. "Labor Market Regulation and Labor Market Performance: Evidence Based on Surveys among Senior Business Executives," Kyklos, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 56(4), pages 509-540, November.
    8. Štěpán Jurajda & Janet Mitchell, 2003. "Markets and Growth," International Economic Association Series, in: Gary McMahon & Lyn Squire (ed.), Explaining Growth, chapter 4, pages 117-158, Palgrave Macmillan.
    9. Osmanovic Armin, 2004. "Wirtschaftswachstum und „neuer Arbeitsmarkt“ in Deutschland," ZFW – Advances in Economic Geography, De Gruyter, vol. 48(1), pages 49-62, October.
    10. Sapir, André, 2000. "Who is Afraid of Globalization? The Challenge of Domestic Adjustment in Europe and America," CEPR Discussion Papers 2595, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    11. Gösta Esping-Andersen, 1996. "Equality or employment? The interaction of wages, welfare states and family change," Transfer: European Review of Labour and Research, , vol. 2(4), pages 615-634, November.
    12. Rebecca M. Blank, "undated". "Is There a Trade-off between Unemployment and Inequality? No Easy Answers: Labor Market Problems in the United States versus Europe," Economics Public Policy Brief Archive ppb_33, Levy Economics Institute.
    13. Muhammad Tariq Majeed & Shamsa Kanwal, 2019. "The Global Integration and Transmission of Social Values: A Case of Family Ties," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 141(2), pages 703-729, January.
    14. Nadeem ul Haque & Musleh ud Din (ed.), 2020. "Public Sector Efficiency: Perspectives on Civil Service Reform," PIDE Books, Pakistan Institute of Development Economics, number 2020:4, December.
    15. Axel Dreher & Noel Gaston, 2008. "Has Globalization Increased Inequality?," Review of International Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 16(3), pages 516-536, August.
    16. Luis Ayala & Rosa Martinez & Jesus Ruiz-Huerta, 2002. "Institutional determinants of the unemployment-earnings inequality trade-off," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 34(2), pages 179-195.
    17. O'Reilly, Jacqueline & Spee, Claudia, 1997. "Regulating work and welfare of the future: Towards a new gender contract?," Discussion Papers, Research Unit: Labor Market Policy and Employment FS I 97-207, WZB Berlin Social Science Center.
    18. Pedro M. Esperança, 2011. "Labor Adjustment Dynamics: An Application Of System Gmm," GEE Papers 0043, Gabinete de Estratégia e Estudos, Ministério da Economia, revised Dec 2011.
    19. Christof Beuselinck & Garen Markarian & Arnt Verriest, 2021. "Employee protection shocks and corporate cash holdings," Post-Print hal-03597869, HAL.
    20. Anna Lo Prete, 2016. "Labour Market Institutions and Household Consumption Insurance within OECD Countries," The World Economy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 39(6), pages 755-771, June.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • J01 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - General - - - Labor Economics: General
    • J28 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Safety; Job Satisfaction; Related Public Policy
    • J53 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Labor-Management Relations, Trade Unions, and Collective Bargaining - - - Labor-Management Relations; Industrial Jurisprudence
    • K31 - Law and Economics - - Other Substantive Areas of Law - - - Labor Law

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:19254. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/nberrus.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.