Spatial Heterogeneity of Housing Space Consumption in Urban China: Locals vs. Inter-and Intra-Provincial Migrants

Yuting Cao,Jin Wen,Ran Liu,Wei Qi

doi:10.3390/su12125206

Abstract

The relationships between migration and housing congestion have attracted attention in engaging the public against the COVID-19 pandemic and some other public health crises. In recent years in China, promoting the citizenization (“shimin hua”) of migrants and improving the quality of urbanization have become the focus of attention in the new-type urbanization today. The housing space consumption of migrants is one of the important indices to look into regarding their real living status in the receiving cities: how do the housing consumption behavior and residential quality vary between the local, inter- and intra-provincial migratory patterns? This article uses the micro household data of the 1% population sampling survey conducted in 2015 by the National Bureau of Statistics of China to look into the spatial variance of the aggregate housing space consumption behaviors of the local and non-local population at the prefectural level and above in urban China. This study finds that: (a) the longer migratory pattern indicates a thriftier housing space consumption that implies a higher probability of residential overcrowding among the inter-provincial migrants; at the same time, the locals enjoy the greater living comfort than their migrant peers; (b) the spatial variance in terms of housing space consumption can be attributed to a series of destination city contexts, such as the geological background, city administrative rank, areal location, local-nonlocal demography, municipal economic growth, and the local residential development levels. The results show that the more “targeted” housing policies are needed to solve the housing difficulties with migrant workers for a goal of human-centered urbanization development. Although we lack the more detailed data-sets to examine the correlation between public health risks (like the COVID-19 pandemic) and housing congestion problems (especially with the population on the move), this research is still illuminating in terms of how to cut down the public health risk in a highly mobile and rapidly urbanizing context like China.

Highlights

The degree of housing congestion is not merely a widely acknowledged indicator of poverty and deprivation, and a target for policy-making in the sphere of public health [1]
The longer migratory pattern indicates a thriftier housing space consumption that implies a higher probability of overcrowding among the inter-provincial migrants; at the same time, the locals enjoy a greater living comfort than their migrant peers
We analyze the driving factors that can explain the spatial variance of housing space consumption among different migration types by using ordinary least squares (OLS), the spatial lag model (SLM), and the spatial error model (SEM)

Summary

Introduction

The degree of housing congestion is not merely a widely acknowledged indicator of poverty and deprivation, and a target for policy-making in the sphere of public health [1]. The overcrowding problem in the rapidly urbanizing areas has become more severe in the past decades than in the OECD (Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development) areas [2]. Since population flow is a correlated factor explaining the spread of COVID-19 in early 2020 in urban China, and because housing overcrowding has a direct or indirect relationship with public health crises, it is believed that the relations between migration and housing congestion have attracted much attention in engaging the public against the epidemic. Disadvantaged residential status and housing conditions (e.g., displacement, crowded housing, and housing insecurity) were associated with lower security attainment, along with higher risks of disease spread. In New York City and California it was reported that higher residential density and severe housing crowding were conducive to the COVID-19 spread. Social distancing [6,7,8,9], quarantine, handwashing and some other sanitation measures were not easy for those living in high-density, precarious or insecure housing conditions

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Conclusion