The Impact Of Residential Community Choice On The Economic And Social Integration Of Migrant Populatio

With the acceleration of China’s urbanization process,migrants have undergone a large-scale migration.The urban settlement and socio-economic integration of migrants play vital roles in the new urbanization,which has been highly valued by the state.Residential neighbourhood choices of migrants are not only related to vital welfare,but also an important reflection of socio-economic integration in local cities,which will directly affect the harmony of the whole society.Based on the China Migrants Dynamic Survey(CMDS)about social integration and mental health in 2013 and 2014,this paper first used factor analysis to construct socio-economic integration of migrants.Then,using mixed OLS model,Propensity Score Matching method(PSM),the Instrumental Variable(IV)method and intermediary effects model,this paper empirically analyzed the impact of neighbourhood choices on socio-economic integration of migrants and its sub-dimension and the underlying mechanism,and better alleviated the endogenous problems.The conclusions are as follows.Overall,most migrants live in informal neighbourhoods,such as urban villages and inner-city old housing neighbourhoods;while migrants living in formal neighbourhoods takes the largest proportion of commercial housing neighbourhoods,the proportion of affordable housing neighbourhoods and unit housing neighbourhoods are relatively small.As to its sub characteristics,there exists heterogeneity in time,gender,age,household registration,education level and city for neighbourhood choices of migrants.Factor analysis is used to construct socio-economic integration of migrants,including economic integration and social integration.Generally speaking,the overall socio-economic integration of migrants is not high,which is 25.83.As to its sub-dimensions,the score of economic integration of migrants is very low(10.89),while the score of social integration of migrants is relatively high(53.91).Regarding the characteristics,there are differences in time,gender,age,household registration,education attainment and city size about socio-economic integration of migrants.Neighbourhood choices have a significant positive impact on the overall socio-economic integration of migrants,i.e.,compared with migrants living in informal neighbourhoods,migrants living in formal neighbourhoods have higher socio-economic integration.This feature is also reflected in its sub-dimensions,that is,neighbourhood choices also have significant positive effects on migrants’ economic integration and social integration.When the neighbourhood is divided into five more specific types,the results show that the socio-economic integration of migrants living in commercial housing neighbourhoods,affordable housing neighbourhoods,work unit housing neighbourhoods and inner-city old housing neighbourhoods is higher than that of migrants living in urban villages.This feature is also reflected in the dimension of social integration.However,from the perspective of economic integration,compared with migrants living in urban village neighbourhoods,the economic integration of migrants living in the commercial housing neighbourhoods,affordable housing neighbourhoods and the unit housing neighbourhoods is higher,while the economic integration of migrants living in the inner city old housing neighbourhoods is lower.Further heterogeneity analysis shows that the impact of residential neighbourhood choices on the overall socio-economic integration of urban-urban migrants is higher than that of rural-urban migrants;the impact of residential neighbourhood choices on the overall socio-economic integration of the old-generaton migrants is higher than that of the new-generation migrants.The residential neighbourhood choices have the greatest impact on the overall socio-economic integration of migrants in the western region,followed by the central region,and the smallest impact on the overall socio-economic integration of migrants in the estern region in China.The above heterogeneity related to migrant type and generation also exists in the impact of residential neighbourhood choices on the economic integration of migrants.However,in terms of region differences,the residential neighbourhood choices have the strongest impact on the economic integration of migrants in the estern region,followed by the impact on the economic integration of migrants in the central region,and the impact on the economic integration of migrants in the western region in China is the weakest.As far as the impact of residential neighbourhood choices on the social integration of migrants is concerned,the heterogeneity of migrant type,generation and region are consistent with the above.Finally,the residential neighbourhood choices do not directly affect the socio-economic integration of migrants,but mainly through the following mechanisms.First,the residential neighbourhood choices can improve the human capital and local social capital of migrants by increasing the expenditure of themselves or spouses for learning,training and education,and expenditure on local guests and gifts,which is conductive to their economic integration.Second,the residential neighbourhood choices can improve the social integration of migrants by improving local social interaction,locial social support,subjective status cognition and respected perception.Accordingly,the government and relevant department should encourage migrants to live in formal neighbourhoods and accelerate the transformation of informal neighbourhoods;promote the mixed residence of migrants and local residents;encourage the migrants to make appropriate human capital investment and the establishment of localized social capital;improve subjective status cognition and respected perception,and guarantee the reasonable housing purchase of migrants,so as to promote their better social integration.