Labor Market Participation of Chinese Agricultural Households

This work is devoted to the analysis of the different labor market participation regimes of Chinese farm households. Using household data over the period 1986-2000 from the province Zhejiang, we apply a multinomial logit model to empirically examine household, farm, and regional characteristics affecting the probability that farmers employ one of four alternative labor market regimes. Results suggest that labor market decisions are significantly related to several personal, farm, and village attitudes. In addition, we find the more market oriented policy reforms at the end of the 1980s stipulated that households participate in labor markets while the more anti-market reforms during the 1990s led to the opposite and encouraged autarky