Heterogeneous effects of rural–urban migration and migrant earnings on land efficiency: Empirical evidence from China

Abstract

On the basis of the conceptual framework of the new economics of labour migration (NELM), this paper demonstrates the effects of rural–urban migration and migrant earnings on land efficiency supported by household-based survey data in six Chinese provinces. Unlike existing literature, we differentiated the effects according to the type of migration and household wealth concurrently. By adopting a two-stage least squares (2SLS) estimator and a recursive mixed-process model, we provide evidence that seasonal and permanent migration negatively affects land efficiency but with no significant difference between the two effects. Migrant earnings results in higher land efficiency, but the compensating effects fall with an increase in household wealth. Interactive analysis on the basis of three wealth groups also illustrates the large compensating effect in the group with less wealth and a descending trend in face of increase in household wealth, which further confirms the robustness of the results.