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Knowing One’s Lot in Life Versus Climbing the Social Ladder: The Formation of Redistributive Preferences in Urban China

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Abstract

This paper examines, how individual preferences for redistribution in general and redistribution to improve access to education, improve social protection for the poor, reduce income inequality and reduce unemployment depend on beliefs about what determines one’s lot in life and self-assessed prospects for climbing the social ladder in urban China. We find that beliefs about what determine one’s lot in life and subjective perceptions of future mobility are correlated with preferences for redistribution. We find that those who believe one’s lot in life is outside their control are generally more likely to favour redistribution. We show that this result is consistent with the existence of an altruism effect among the rich and entitlement effect among the poor. These findings are robust to the inclusion of control variables for the respondent’s personal characteristics and the location in which he or she lives.

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Notes

  1. Tao Zhiyong, Deputy Division Chief, Department of Social Security, All-China Federation of Trade Unions, National Social Insurance Administration Workshop, Beijing, August 2006.

  2. In the survey age is a categorical variable, so we were unable to examine whether there is a non-linear relationship between ageing and preferences for redistribution.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Monash University, Melbourne, VIC, Australia

    Russell Smyth, Vinod Mishra & Xiaolei Qian

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  1. Russell Smyth
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  2. Vinod Mishra
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  3. Xiaolei Qian
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Correspondence to Russell Smyth.

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Smyth, R., Mishra, V. & Qian, X. Knowing One’s Lot in Life Versus Climbing the Social Ladder: The Formation of Redistributive Preferences in Urban China. Soc Indic Res 96, 275–293 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11205-009-9478-x

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