The Informal Employment of Floating Workers in Beijing and Its Transition to Formal Employment

• In Event: 573 - Section on Labor and Labor Movements Paper Session. Labor Formations in the Global South

Abstract

This article focuses on the informal employees in Beijing, most of who are floating people (migrants) and excluded from the social insurance system with low income and working in marginal labor market. By adopting the data from the Survey of the Working Condition of Floating People in Beijing, this article compared the socioeconomic status between the formal workers and informal workers of floating people and also tried to expand previous research by exploring the determinants of informal employment and the transition between formal and informal status, which is not single-track. The results showed that except for the higher income, former migrants, including relatives or friends, may also be the impetus for the floating people workers to join the informal employment. Besides, the education level of floating people tends to be the most important determinant of the working status. Ex-formal workers with lower educational level may even transit to informal ones.

Author

• Menghan Zhao, University of Pennsylvania