Research On Informal System And Relative Poverty Of Rural Families

In 2020,all the rural population in our country will be lifted out of poverty under the current standards,and all the poverty-stricken counties will be lifted,but this does not mean that poverty has come to an end.At present,the problem of unbalanced and insufficient economic development in our country is still relatively prominent,and there is a wide gap between urban and rural development,relative poverty has become the main form of poverty in our country,and it presents the characteristics of complexity and persistence,poverty governance has also entered a new stage accordingly.As the main battlefield for poverty alleviation,the living environment is fragile and the factors causing poverty are more diversified in rural areas.When absolute poverty is resolved,it is still faced with a relatively serious problem of relative poverty.The foundation of rural revitalization is not yet solid.Although it is necessary to pay attention to the role of formal system in order to better consolidate the achievements of poverty alleviation and realize rural revitalization,the informal system have always played an important role in the rural areas of our country,where the society of "acquaintances" has always played an important role,and cannot be completely replaced by formal system.Especially at present,China’s market economy is still underdeveloped,and the formal system is not perfect.In some rural areas,the role of the formal system is limited,while the informal system has become an important driving force for our country’s rural social governance and improvement of relative poverty.However,such informal constraints lack enforcement mechanism.In rural areas of our country,there are many forms of informal systems,such as collectivism,clan culture,neighborhood relationships,etc.Research on the effect and mechanism of these informal systems at different levels on relative poverty of rural families is of great significance for promoting relative poverty governance and realizing rural revitalization.By sorting out and summarizing the existing literature on informal system and relative poverty,this paper summarizes the concepts and basic theories of informal system and relative poverty.Based on the time evolution of the stratification theory,the system is divided into the collectivism at the first level and the clan culture or neighborhood relations at the second level.Therefore,based on the theoretical research on the informal system and the relative poverty of rural families,the empirical research on the informal system and the relative poverty of rural families is mainly carried out from three aspects: collectivism,clan culture and neighborhood relations:First,this paper uses the data of China Family Panel Studies 2018(CFPS)to conduct an empirical study on the relationship between first-level collectivism and the relative poverty of rural families.It can be found that the collectivism significantly reduces the possibility of rural families falling into relative poverty,which is because the collectivism has a greater impact on the increase of rural family’ income than urban family.Moreover,the study suggests that this effect is achieved through increased social interaction.Furthermore,the influence of collectivism on the relative poverty of rural families may be different,and this influence is greater for the rural families with less digitized,non-socially-insured,and risk-averse rural households.In addition,the method of instrumental variables is used to solve the possible endogenous problems of collectivism and the relative poverty of rural families.Second,this paper uses the data of China Labor-force Dynamic Survey(CLDS)of Sun Yatsen University to empirically analyze the relationship between clan culture and the relative poverty of rural families in the second level.The study found that the stronger the clan culture,the higher the possibility of rural families falling into relative poverty,which is realized by impeding the development of rural non-agricultural economy and squeezing out the demand for formal insurance.The election of a big surname as a village director can significantly reduce the impact of clan culture on the relative poverty of rural families.In addition,the impact of clan culture on the relative poverty of rural families may be different.This impact is larger in the south,where villages are open,where the per capita arable land area of the family is less,and the rural families with a junior high school degree or below.In addition,the method of instrumental variables is used to solve the possible endogeneity problem of clan culture and the relative poverty of rural families.Finally,this paper uses the data of China Labor-force Dynamic Survey(CLDS)of Sun Yatsen University to empirically analyze the relationship between another informal system neighborhood relationship in the second level and the relative poverty of rural families.It is found that the good neighborhood relationship can significantly reduces the possibility of rural families falling into relative poverty,because the income effect brought by the good neighborhood relationship has a greater impact on rural families than urban families.The research on the mechanism between the two shows that this effect is achieved by increasing the enthusiasm of household investment activities.The degree of labor marketization significantly reduces the impact of neighborhood relations on the relative poverty of rural families.In addition,the impact of neighborhood relationships on the relative poverty of rural families may vary,which is greater in northern regions,non-opening areas,and households with more per capita arable land.In addition,the method of instrumental variables is used to solve the possible endogeneity problems of neighborhood relations and the relative poverty of rural families.The innovation of this paper is reflected in the following aspects: Firstly,using the theory of stratification,the informal system in rural hidden level is divided into the first level of collectivism and the second level of clan culture and neighborhood relations,the layer theory provides a new research perspective for the relative poverty of rural families.Secondly,using the methods of theoretical analysis,measurement and comparison,it systematically reveals the influence of informal system on the relative poverty of rural families,enriching and expanding the research content in the field of relative poverty.Finally,it is found that different forms of informal system collectivism,clan culture and neighborhood relationship have different impacts on relative poverty of rural families.The shortcomings of this paper are: Firstly,this paper use a certain proportion of the median per capita income of households in the survey data to identify relatively poor objects in rural areas,although there is evidence to support it,it is inevitable that there will be errors as a means of indirect measurement.Otherwise,this paper did not conduct research on multidimensional poverty in rural areas.Secondly,for the informal system at the implicit level in rural areas,we only focus on the more important dimensions,namely the first level of informal system collectivism and the second level of informal system clan culture and neighborhood relations,which may not cover all dimensions of the informal system,and the impact of each dimension should be considered more comprehensively in future research.Finally,due to the limitation of the survey data,the impact of collectivism on the relative poverty of rural families uses cross-sectional data.To ensure the robustness of the regression results,future research should focus on tracking households in order to use panel data.