The Forgotten People: The Impact of Land-Loss on Chinese Farmers’ Happiness

Abstract

Since the 1980s, China’s development and urbanization have led to many farmers losing their land. Most of those land-lost farmers live in urban areas. This paper uses data from the 2018 China Family Panel Study to explore the factors that impact the happiness of land-lost farmers. After controlling for eight variables from three aspects - demographic variables, socioeconomic variables, and social helping variables - it is clear that the experience of land loss hurts farmers’ happiness. This is because the experience of land loss contributes to the loss of social status and psychological health issues caused by the imbalance of low fees paid for land expropriation. The government should consider slowing down the pace of urbanization since it brings less happiness for farmers on average.