Research On The Impact Of Regional Housing Inequality On Individuals' Housing Consumption And Life Satisfaction

Since the 1980 s,China has carried out the housing market-oriented reform,from the unit-based welfare housing distribution model to the market-based monetization distribution model.Although the market-oriented transformation of housing policy has effectively improved people's living quality,the rate of housing integrity and housing-related supporting infrastructure,it has also led to a rapid rise in housing price,a relatively higher proportion of housing wealth in total household wealth,and the rapidly increasing housing inequality.The rising housing price and degree of housing inequality has been reshaping the urban development and strengthening the social stratification in China.As for the above problems,the existing research draws the following conclusions: housing has the dual attributes of consumption and investment.Housing consumption is affected by individual factors,unit characteristics,housing provident fund,economic development level,household registration system and other related policies.The gradual nature and path dependence of housing reform makes market forces based on economic capacity and preferences and institutional rules jointly promote the increasing housing inequality,which is mainly manifested as regional inequality.Most of the research points out that the housing property,price and inequality in housing area have a significant impact on individuals' life satisfaction.However,there is little research on the regional inequality in housing value,numbers and areas at the provincial and city levels and their compositions and changing patterns.Moreover,the impact of regional housing inequality on individual's housing consumption and life satisfaction is still under-explored.Based on the data of China Household Finance Survey from 2011 to 2015,this study aims to examine the inequalities in the number of houses,housing wealth and living area at the provincial and municipal levels,investigate the impact of housing inequalities on an individual's housing tenure choice,the number of houses,living area and the subjective well-being,and explore the contribution of housing inequalities to the housing-related life satisfaction.This study enriches relevant literature on housing consumption and housing inequality.The research conclusions help further understand the composition and changing pattern of regional housing inequality in terms of different dimensions of housing consumption in the process of China's rapid housing market reform.It depicts a full picture of the shocks of regional housing inequality on individuals' housing consumption and life satisfaction.It provides quantitative basis and theoretical reference for regulating regional housing inequality,improving residential housing consumption level and living satisfaction,and then promoting economic development and social integration.The results show that first,there is significant regional housing inequality in China.The inequalities of the number of houses and living area is relatively small,about 0.15 and 0.4 respectively,and the inequality of housing wealth is high,about 0.7.In general,the extent of housing inequalities at the city level is slightly lower than that at the provincial and national levels.The first and second houses are the biggest contributor to the regional housing inequality.The housing inequalities mainly comes from the inequalities across provinces and cities as well as between urban and rural areas.The change of inequality of the number of houses caused by the change of individual's position within the province and the city is the same as that caused by the increase of the number of houses,but the change of inequality of housing wealth and living area caused by the change of individual's position within the province and the city is slightly smaller than that caused by the growth of housing wealth and living area.Second,the regional housing inequality has a significant impact on individual housing consumption.The inequality of the number of houses at the city level has a significant and positive impact on the housing ownership and the number of houses those respondents possess.The inequality of housing wealth at the provincial level has a significant and negative impact on the housing wealth,but a positive and impact on the living area.In contrast,the inequality of housing wealth at the city level has a significant and negative impact on the housing ownership and housing wealth.The potential reasons for the different directions and extents of the impact of housing inequalities at different levels on individual's housing consumption are as follows: on the one hand,the demonstration effect plays a dominant role in determining one's housing consumption.The moderate increase of housing inequalities will make individuals have the expectation of improvement of their own housing situation in the future.Thus,the increase of housing inequalities could significantly improve an individual's housing consumption.However,after exceeding a certain degree,people might think that other's housing consumption level could not achievable by themselves,and thus reduce the current housing consumption.On the other hand,houses have the property of status goods.The expansion of housing consumption gap could lower one's social status and generate a sense of social deprivation.In order to maintain their existing social status,people may increase their current housing consumption or reduce the current housing consumption inorder to improve the future housing consumption through increasing savings.In addition,there are some differences in the cognition and attitude towards the housing inequalities at different levels.Usually,the housing inequality at the city level is more caused by the differences in the "effort factors" that can be managed by individuals themselves.Individuals think that the housing level of others can be achieved.However,the housing inequality at the provincial level is mainly caused by the differences in "environmental factors" that are not controlled by people.Their cognition of it is just the opposite.Third,an individual's life satisfaction is mainly affected by the regional inequality in housing value and living area.The increase in housing wealth inequality at the provincial level has a significant and negative impact on life satisfaction through comparison effect,while the increase in the inequality of housing wealth at the city level has a significant and positive effect on life satisfaction through demonstration effect.At the provincial level,the increase in the inequality of living area could significantly promote one's subjective well-being.The reason is that when the extent of inequality is relatively small,the impact on individual's well-being is mainly dominated by the demonstration effect.The investigation on influencing channels shows that the housing wealth inequality at the provincial level could affects one's subjective well-being through decreasing their housing wealth and increasing the living area.The inequality of housing wealth at the city level could impact people's subjective well-being by decreasing the propensity of owning a house and the housing wealth.Higher subjective well-being mainly concentrates in people with higher housing consumption level.The contribution of inequality in living area to inequality of subjective well-being is the highest,ranging from 12.51% to 16.81%.The contribution of housing wealth inequality is between 4.11%-4.27%.the contribution of the inequality in the number of houses is the lowest,ranging from 1.74% to 1.78%.In addition,there is significant heterogeneity in the impact of regional housing inequality on individual's housing consumption and subjective well-being across gender,age groups,education levels,income levels and regions.