Rural-Urban Economic Disparities among China’s Elderly

For both sectors, the young (60-69) report higher incomes than the old (70-79). Two thirds
of the young rural households receive income of at least 1000 yuan per year, whereas about
60 percent of the old households fall in that income range. A similar income/age
relationship can be found in the urban sector for these two age groups. Among the oldest
old (80 and over), however, the pattern is a bit different with a larger proportion reporting
zero income - 13.4 percent of the rural households and 5 percent of the urban households -
but a relatively significant proportion reporting very high incomes. In other words income
inequality seems to be higher among the oldest old, in both sectors.¹¹

4.4. Income and “family type”

Benjamin and Brandt (1999) suggest that two factors have contributed to the worsening of
income inequality in rural China. First, uneven factors markets, and second the changing
role of the family as a form of redistribution of income. Households, that in the past
played the role of redistribution of income, are now changing for several reasons. There is
a growing number of single families (elderly living alone or as a conjugal unit), which
means the elderly cannot count on theirs children’s support as much as they have in the
past.¹² We would expect these households more likely to have lower incomes and
therefore to be poorer than the multiple-generation-type-households.

How does the type of family affect household income? A cross-tabulation between
the two variables is presented in table 8.

Table 8: Family income by generation (% of households)

¹¹ In a recent study by Yi (2002) the rural oldest old were found to have far less pension support, be
significantly less educated, more likely to be widowed and to rely on children for support.

¹² For instance, in northeast China the number of nuclear families went from 33.6% in 1935 to 75.1% 1995
(Benjamin and Brandt, 1999)

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