Study On The Development Of Division Of Labor And The Evolution Trend Of Urban-Rural Income Gap

By 2020,the income gap between urban and rural areas in China has dropped from 3.3 in 2009 to 2.56 in terms of the ratio of per capita disposable income of urban residents to per capita net income of rural residents,which is an important achievement of the Party’s 18 th National Congress since the opening of a new journey of common prosperity.This ratio continues to show a general downward trend,but it is still on the high side.Further narrowing the income gap between urban and rural areas is an inherent requirement for China to build a strong socialist modern country.The issue of urban-rural income disparity needs to be addressed in the context of the economic development mechanism in which division of labor development and market expansion are cyclically accumulated and mutually promoted.Guided by Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era,this paper is based on Marxist political economy and follows Engels’ teaching that "the problem is easiest to understand from the viewpoint of division of labor",in order to explore the economic development mechanism of division of labor development and market expansion in the Communist Manifesto,which is cumulative and mutually reinforcing.Taking the idea of the mechanism of division of labor and market expansion as the starting point and the institutional conditions for their continuous operation,we deepen our study of Marx and Engels’ idea of division of labor and market,and clarify the content of "division of labor depends on the scale of the market,and the scale of the market depends on the division of labor",which was first and most completely discussed by Marx and Engels.Based on the scientific connotation of division of labor as the "general form of social labor" and its inherent composition consisting of diversification of professions,specialization of labor,roundabout production and organization of economy,the theoretical analysis framework of economic development mechanism consisting of four major parts: division of labor development,market expansion and demand side,productivity level and supply side,and government is proposed..Under this framework,we study the trend of urban-rural income gap,absorb the idea of dual economic structure of emerging classical economics on the evolution of division of labor,construct a theoretical model of division of labor development and the trend of urban-rural income gap,and explain the mechanism of division of labor in Kuznets’ "inverted U" hypothesis.With the introduction of the concept of the degree of involvement of division of labor,we focus on the analysis of the trend of the development process of division of labor coverage on the evolution of the urban-rural income gap as the transaction efficiency increases:insufficient and unbalanced development of division of labor leads to the widening of the urban-rural income gap,while the reduction of the urban-rural income gap requires more sufficient and balanced development of division of labor.Social infrastructure construction includes both tangible physical infrastructure construction and intangible institutional construction.This paper selects three aspects of road transportation construction,opening up to the outside world,and network development,which are closely and significantly related to the production and life of the general public since the reform and opening up in 1978,for empirical analysis.The theoretical model is tested and it is proved that the social infrastructure construction influences the "inverted U" shape of the urban-rural income gap by improving the transaction efficiency and promoting the positive development of the division of labor involvement.Based on the findings of the study,we propose policy recommendations for narrowing the urban-rural income gap by actively promoting the construction of transportation infrastructure in the central and western regions and rural areas,deepening the opening level of inland regions to build a unified national market,and promoting the fuller and more balanced development of information technology networking,taking into account the actual situation in China.Optimizing social infrastructure construction and achieving fuller and more balanced division of labor development will promote common prosperity for all people.