Research On Social Stratification Effects Of Urbanites’ Housing Choices

Urban housing system in China has experienced the historical changes from thephysical housing allocation system to the commoditized housing system since the reformand opening-up. Which makes the urbanites begin to own the freedom of housing choice,and at the same time, also brings the problem that unequal housing resource allocation.Based on this background, this paper shows a research on the social stratification effects ofurbanites’ housing choices in transitional China, using the method of combing thenormative analysis and the empirical research.Firstly, the mechanism of the social stratification effects of urbanites’ housing choicesis explained based on the theories about transitional economics, housing choice and socialstratification. Then, with the data of CGSS2008, using the method of latent class analysisand ordered Logit model, the objective social stratification effects and the subjective classidentity effects of the urbanites’ housing choices are tested.The conclusions from this research can be generalized as that the urbanites’ housingchoices have caused obvious social stratification effects, while these effects could bedivided two aspects, one is the objective social stratification effects, the other is thesubjective class identity effects. Specifically,(1) the roots causing the objective socialstratification effects of the urbanites’ housing choices are the housing choose freedom to theurbanites and the double dominant mechanism to the housing resource allocation, a trend ofstratification is shown beside the urbanites’ housing choices, that is, the probability ofhomeownership is greater to who owns a higher social class status, and not only inside theurbanites who own-occupy houses, but also inside the urbanites who rent houses, theprobabilities of living in a better housing community and owning a large house are greaterto who owns a higher social class status.(2) the roots causing the subjective class identityeffects of the urbanites’ housing choices are the housing choose freedom to the urbanitesand the prominence of the material and symbolic of the house as the property resource. Theurbanites’ housing choice has a considerable degree influence on his/her class identity, theprobability of owning a higher class identity is greater to whom lives in a better housingcommunity, owning complete homeownership and a larger house. The policy revelations from the research are that the government should take actions tocurb the social stratification effects of urbanites’ housing choices, such as strengthening thecomprehensive reform in the housing sector, building a fair and harmonious housingresource allocation order, guiding the urbanites to understand the role and function ofhousing rationally, promoting the community integration between different class ofurbanites.