Has China crossed the river? The evolution of wage structure in urban China during reform and retrenchment

In this paper, we examine the determinants of urban wages in China from 1988 to 2002. We find increased returns to education but a decrease in the returns to experience. The 2002 data imply that the widening pure gender gap and the growth in the premium to Communist Party membership may have come to an end. The reform of the state-owned enterprise (SOE) sector and the shift in industrial structure out of heavy industry is shown to impact wages of workers within those sectors. We use recall panel data for 1998 to 2002 to provide fixed effects estimates of the impact of sector ownership, Communist Party membership and unemployment on wages. Journal of Comparative Economics 33 (4) (2005) 644-663. School of Economics, University of Nottingham, University Park, Nottingham NG7 2RD, UK; School of Sociology and Social Policy, University of Nottingham, NG7 2RD, UK; School of Economics, Peking University, Beijing, China 100871. (c) 2005 Association for Comparative Economic Studies. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.