Labor-quantity-quality-1978-2025-16May05.doc 1 The Quantity and Quality of Labor in China 1978-2000-2025 (May 2005)

The purpose of this manuscript is to construct the economy-wide number of laborers by “age times education ” (at each age with a break-down by education) for each year of the reform period (1978-2003), as well as to forecast the number of laborers by age times education through 2025. These are the raw data for use in the construction of measures of the quantity and quality of labor. The manuscript starts with an introduction to how data on population (including laborers) are collected and evaluates the age-specific data. The second and third section examine the changes to the classification into different education categories over time and the changes in the rate of completion of a particular level of schooling. The fourth section explains how missing education-specific data on laborers (by age) in key years are constructed, while the fifth section derives data on total employment. The sixth section combines the available data from censuses and 1 % sample surveys to construct age- and education-specific data on laborers for each year of the reform period, from 1978-2003; the seventh section creates forecasts of the number of laborers by age times education through 2025. The results, the aggregate quantity of laborers and various human capital measures fo