CAER中国农村改革40周年专题之《大迁徙：改革开放以来中国农业剩余劳动力是如何转移和再分配的？》

本期导读：

CAER 2018年第一期中国农村改革40周年专题之一：《大迁徙：改革开放以来中国农业剩余劳动力是如何转移和再分配的？》

本文通过相关文献回顾和数据分析，较为全面地回顾了40年来农业剩余劳动力转移和再分配的发展演变历程，揭示了农业劳动再分配的过程及其增长效果主要得益于人力资源的充分供给，资本收益递减的抑制，劳动生产率的提高。

      在过去的40年中，相关领域的改革消除了劳动力流动的体制障碍，推动了农民工就业的转移，突破了城乡边界、地区、行业和所有制的限制，从低生产力的农业行业转向具有更高劳动生产力的非农部门。因此，资源配置效率有了持续提高，显著地促进了劳动生产率的增长，从而促进了整个中国经济的增长。

The Great Exodus: How agricultural surplus laborers have been transferred and reallocated in China’s reform period?

Fang Cai (pp. 3 - 15)

Keywords: Chinese economy, Hukou system reform, Labour transfer, Resources reallocation

Type: Research paper

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to review the process of rural labor reallocation and unfolds its growth effect through sufficiently supplying human resources,preventing diminishing return to capital, and increasing labor productivity.

Design/methodology/approach

The author surveys literature and statistics related to the subject to comprehensively picture the 40-year course of the shift and reallocation of agricultural surplus labor.

Findings

In the past 40 years, reforms in relevant areas have eliminated institutional barriers deterring labor mobility and allowed agricultural laborers to exit from low-productivity farming employment, migrate beyond rural-urban boundary and across regions, sectors, and ownerships, and enter higher productivity employment in non-agricultural sectors. As a result, resources allocative efficiency has been substantially improved, contributing a significant part tolabor productivity growth and thus economic growth of the Chinese economy as a whole.

Social implications

To sustain this source of economic growth as far as China completes its transition from upper-middle income status to high-income status, deepening reforms is urgently needed. The author provides policy suggestions for further reform.

Originality/value

This paper enhances people’s understanding of the Chinese economic reform and its nature of efficiency and inclusion.