Period, Economy And Policy Effects

Social mobility consciousness is the subjective perception of the objective individual class mobility.This paper explored the changes in social mobility consciousness and its mechanism based on the Chinese General Social Survey(CGSS2005-2015)data.In this paper,we outlined the trends of changes in the social mobility consciousness in Chinese society,and examined the effect of time,economic development,and social policies on social mobility consciousness.Overall,the social mobility consciousness in china is on the rise regarding either the average social mobility consciousness or the proportion of upward social mobility consciousness.More than half of the people questioned thought they experienced upward social mobility in a decade.Regarding the effect of time,the upward social mobility consciousness increases with time during the period from 2005 to 2015.Moreover,the effect of time is significantly enhanced when subjective social class in considered at the same time.In addition,the effect of time is still obviously positive when the effect of age and generation are controlled.In terms of the effect of economic development,our analysis finds that economic development can effectively enhance the social mobility consciousness.At the individual level,the provincial GDP growth per capita has significantly improved individual social mobility consciousness.However,at the provincial level,the effect of short-term change in provincial GDP per capitais no longer significant,only the long-term change in provincial GDP per capita maintains a significant effect.It suggests that what improves social mobility consciousness at a provincial level is the long-term change effect of economic development(i.e.,growth rate).Regarding social policy,its positive effect on social mobility consciousness is clearly tilted towards the more vulnerable groups.Although the overall social mobility consciousness is increasing,large discrepancy exists among different social groups.Specifically,the relatively vulnerable groups have stronger sense of benefit and high social mobility consciousness.Social mobility consciousness of rural residents is significantly higher than towns residents;occupational status and income have a certain degree of depression effect or trend,that is,the mobility consciousness of the relatively middle social group is significantly lower.The effect of social policies can be summarized as above.