Empirical Analysis Of The Informal Employment Choice Behavior In China

According to China’s Ministry of human resources and social security, the informal employment is known as a kind of fact labor relationship employment behavior without signing labor contract. With the development of economic globalization and industry division of labor is increasingly subdivision, scale of informal employment in the context of the world presents a trend of expansion. With the continuous development of economic society, informal employment in China presents the vigorous development. According to estimates, total number of China’s urban informal employment has been more than50%of total employment.Since the informal employment choice behavior has not reached a consensus on the controversy, this paper aims to address the following questions:first, the factors which influence urban residents choose informal employment? Second,whether all the informal employment results are lower than the regular employment? Third, is there heterogeneity in informal employment at the presence? In view of the above problems, this paper uses1997-2009China Health and Nutrition Survey (CHNS) data to analysis China’s urban informal employment behavior selection mechanism and the influence factors by Probit model and the heterogeneity between "upper tier" and "lower tier" by Hierarchical Linear Model.Study finds:1. Informal employees informal employees age span of is big and generally younger than the formal employment; regular employees’average educational level is generally higher than that of informal employment, with the level of higher education workers propensity to engage in informal employment; informal employment’s occupation is concentrated in the service sector, and regular employees’ occupation is mainly distributed in the senior professional and technical workers, the general professional and technical workers, managers, general office personnel and technical workers; informal employment and informal employment work time is roughly the same, but the formal employment’s average income level is higher than that of informal employment.2. Young and female employees’ choice of informal employment is possibly larger; the higher the level of education, engaged in informal employment possibility smaller; compared to other regions of Guangxi and Guizhou, the employment choice of informal employment and the possibility of higher; large family size and family in the elderly aged65and above in the employment selection informal employment is less likely, the home has6children under the age of the workers tend to engage in informal employment; income level for employment selection effect uncertainty.3. There is the heterogeneity in choice factors of the informal employment in urban residents of China between high income group and low income group. Gender and education on high income group and low income group the employment selection effects with larger heterogeneity, specific performance for the high income groups in males can predict a higher probability of informal employment choice behavior, level of education is higher and more inclined to choose informal employment; low income groups in women with a higher probability of informal employment choice behavior, higher education choice of informal employment possibility smaller.