Marriage and Cohabitation in Contemporary China

Yu Xie University of Michigan and

Peking University

Part I: Traditional Chinese Family

Importance of family in Chinese culture

• (1) Family is cherished in folk religion.

– Ancestors are worshiped.

“If you are not filial to parents, it is useless to pray to God”

Importance of family in Chinese culture

• (2) Filial piety is considered an

important character (or merit),

especially important for public

figures. (Can be basis for

promotion.)

Importance of family in Chinese culture

• (3) Family is an extremely important

source of support (money, emotion,

education, old-age support, etc.).

• Informal/Internal transfers of resources

Erosion of the Traditional family in Contemporary

China?

• Yes, to some extent.

• It’s part of a global phenomenon,

“Second Demographic Transition.”

Second Demographic Transition

• Main driving force: individual

freedom, as a result of further

economic development.

• Main institution being affected: the

family.

• Main indicators of the second

demographic transition.

Main Indicators of the Second Demographic Transition

• Late age of marriage.

• Premarital sex.

• Non-marital cohabitation.

• Widespread of divorce.

• Children born to unmarried mothers.

• Children raised by single/divorced

parents.

Part II: China versus Asia

Social/Economic Changes in AsiaGDP per capita (PPP adjusted)a

Year China Japan Korea Taiwan

1970 361 13,773 2,808 3,539

1975 429 15,933 3,788 4,932

1980 563 18,749 5,179 7,424

1985 960 21,919 7,191 9,263

1990 1,154 27,718 11,643 13,638

1995 1,931 28,970 15,889 18,542

2000 2,822 29,790 18,729 23,065

2005 4,335 31,380 22,577 26,693

2010 7,130 31,447 26,609 32,105

Has the Second Demographic Transition Occurred in Asia?

Total fertility rateYea

r China Japan Korea Taiwan197

0 5.5 2.1 4.5 3.7197

5 3.8 1.9 3.4 3.0198

0 2.6 1.9 3.4 2.5198

5 2.6 1.8 1.7 1.9199

0 2.3 1.5 1.6 1.8199

5 1.9 1.4 1.6 1.8200

0 1.7 1.4 1.5 1.7200

5 1.7 1.3 1.1 1.1201

0 1.6 1.4 1.2 0.9

Has the Second Demographic Transition Occurred in Asia?

Mean age at first marriage (men)Yea

r China Japan Korea Taiwan197

0 -- 26.9 27.1 --197

5 -- 27.0 27.4 26.6198

0 25 27.8 27.3 27.4198

5 -- 28.2 27.0 28.4199

0 24 28.4 27.8 29.0199

5 -- 28.5 28.4 30.1200

0 -- 28.8 29.3 30.3200

5 27 29.8 30.9 30.6201

0 26 30.5 31.8 31.8

Summary• Late age of marriage (Mu and Xie 2014; Yu

and Xie 2013)• Low fertility (well known)• Relatively high cohabitation rate (Yu and

Xie 2014)• Relatively high divorce rate (to be studied)• Women’s high level of education and high

level of labor force participation (Wang and Xie 2013)

• Relatively high rate of nuclear family form (Chu et al 2011; Xu et al. 2014)

• Few to nil out-of-wedlock births (known; to be studied)

Part III: Determinants of Marriage

General Observations• Women’s education attainment has reached parity with men.

• Economic factors have become important determinant of marriage (Yu and Xie 2013).

• Local housing price has deterring effects on age of marriage (Yu and Xie 2013).

• Hypergamy marriage pattern persists.

• Age gap between husband and wife has increased (Mu and Xie 2014).

A Key Finding of Mu and Xie (2014)

40

50

60

70

Per

cent

age

1940 1945 1950 1955 1960 1965 1970 1975 1980 1985Birth Cohort

Men Women

Note: Age homogamy is defined as marriages with husband-minus-wife age gaps lying between[0,3] years. For this figure, percentages of age homogamy are calculated only for those who gotmarried at median age of first marriage within each birth cohort from 1940 to 1984, respectivelyfor men and women. To observe the trends more clearly, we constructed moving averages forthe adjacent seven birth cohorts with equal weights.Source: National Bureau of Statistics of China, China 2005 1% Population Inter-census Survey.

Figure 3 Percentage of Age Homogamy with Moving Averagesfor Marriages with Birth Cohort Median Age at Marriage, by Gender

Changes in the Determinants of Marriage Entry in Post-Reform Urban China

(Yu and Xie 2013)

Background

• China has a tradition of early and universal marriage.

• During the economic reform, China has undergone many social changes, including consumer revolution, SOE reform, housing reform.

• After the economic reform, marriage is now a manifestation of stratification; economic prospect has become an important determinant of marriage.

Figure 1a. Kaplan-Meier survival curves of transitions to first marriage for urban males by education(2005 Mini Census Data)

Figure 1.b Kaplan-Meier survival curves of transitions to first marriage for urban females by education(2005 Mini Census Data)

Research Questions

• Have economic variables become more

important in predicting marriage formation?

• Do local housing prices mediate the

relationship between an individual’s

economic status and his/her marriage

behavior?

• Data and Variables

• Data 2003 and 2008 China General Social Survey (Urban

Residents)• Method• Discrete-time hazard model• Variables Birth Cohorts

Pre-reform cohort (born before 1960) Early-reform cohort (born from 1960 to 1973) Late-reform cohort (born after 1974)

Time-invariant Father’s education; Ethnicity

Time-variant Age (spline function); Years of schooling;

Enrollment ;Work status: unemployment, employed in state sector, employed in non-state sector; Hukou

City-level variable Housing price (inflated by CPI, from 1991 to 2008)

Transition to First Marriage for Men: hazard model logit coefficients VARIABLES Pre-reform

Cohort(N=15,107)

Early-reform Cohort

(N=11,068)

Late-reform Cohort(N=5,573)

Work status (RG: Employed in non-state sector )   Unemployment -0.138 -0.510*** -1.975***  (0.113) (0.178) (0.486) Employed in state sector 0.307*** 0.229** -0.092  (0.077) (0.096) (0.148)Years of schooling -0.016 -0.052*** -0.101***  (0.011) (0.016) (0.027)Age (spline function)      

15-21 0.431*** 0.647*** 0.671***  (0.036) (0.0519) (0.0931)

22-25 0.365*** 0.351*** 0.483***  (0.029) (0.034) (0.054)

26-30 0.00284 -0.067 0.150*  (0.032) (0.049) (0.079)

31- -0.078*** 0.202** 0.223  (0.019) (0.082) (0.296) Other Variables Controlled(Father’s education, Ethnicity, Enrollment, Hukou ) 

Housing Reform and Housing Prices (Song and Xie 2014) • Housing reform (1988-1999) changed

housing as a danwei benefit to be a

commodity purchasable on the

market.

• Led to sharp increases in both

housing stock and housing prices.

• Economic determinants have

become more important

Market factors have become more important as housing determinants over

time (Song and Xie 2014)

  1988 1995 2002

     

Years of schooling 0.013*** 0.032*** 0.054***

  (0.001) (0.003) (0.003)

       

Cadre 0.089*** 0.070*** 0.106***

  (0.014) (0.019) (0.024)

Education’s role is up; cadre’s role is down

Regional Variation

• Regional variation is huge in China

Housing Price and Men’s Age of Marriage

Baotou

Lanzhou

Wuhan

Nanjing Shanghai

Beijing

Guangzhou

Chongqing

Xi'an

21

22

23

24

25

26

27

28

29

30

Med

ian m

arr

iag

e a

ge for

loca

l me

n

0 .05 .1 .15 .2 .25 .3 .35 .4 .45 .5 .55 .6

Average housing price during 2000-2003 (Unit: 10,000RMB/square meter)

Shenzhen

Transition to First Marriage for men and women: interaction with housing price (Yu and Xie 2013)  Male   Female

  Model 1 Model 2   Model 3 Model 4

           

Schooling Years -0.113*** -0.229***   -0.130*** -0.175***

  (0.032) (0.053)   (0.027) (0.037)

Housing price (10000 RMB)

0.360 -5.490**   -0.152 -2.951*(0.487) (2.166)   (0.404) (1.639)

Housing price*schooling years   0.462***     0.226*

  (0.166)     (0.128)

Constant -18.90*** -18.48***   -22.26*** -22.05***

  (2.530) (2.550)   (3.201) (3.207)

N 3,914 3,914   4,629 4,629

a. The sample is restricted to the respondents born after 1976, since the data of house price begins from 1991.b. The unit of the house price is 10 thousand RMB per square meter.

Figure 2.a Varying Effects of Years of Schooling on Marriage Risk at Different Levels of Housing Price for Men

0 3 6 9 12 15 18 210

0.10.20.30.40.50.60.70.80.9

1

House price=0.2528House price=0.4956House price=1House price=1.4091

Schooling years

Pred

icte

d Pr

obab

ility

Figure 2b. Varying Effects of Years of Schooling on Marriage Risk at Different Levels of Housing Price for Women

0 4 8 12 16 200

0.10.20.30.40.50.60.70.80.9

1

House price=0.2528

Schooling years

Pred

icte

d Pr

obab

ility

Summary

• In general, employment status has become increasingly important for marriage formation for men in urban China.

• The advantage of working in state sector in marriage formation process has declined in recent decades for both men and women.

• The effect of educational attainment varied with local housing price for both men and women.

Part IV: Cohabitation

Cohabitation in China: Social Determinants and Consequences(Yu and Xie 2014)

Motivation• Cohabitation in China has seldom been studied.

Due to lack of suitable data.• The aim of this paper is to provide national

estimates of cohabitation in China for the first time. We focus on PrevalenceSocial determinantsDemographic consequences

The value of studying cohabitation when it just became accepted. Who starts the practice, high status or low status people? Diffusion across social groups.

Chinese Context

• Social environment

Closed-door policy has been broken by the reform that

began in 1978.

Chinese people have gradually become more familiar with

Western culture through various channels.

• Ideological environment

Collectivism during Mao era

Rise in individualism:

• Weaken the restriction of traditional norms on individual

behavior, more emphasis on individual interest

• Tolerance of premarital sex

Protection of personal privacy

Contextual Factors

• Economic and institutional environment

University expansion→ without the

supervision of parents for college students

Housing reform in urban areas

Legal description: change the wording

from “illegal cohabitation” to “non-marital

cohabitation”

Increase in divorce rate and delay in first

marriage age

Data and Variables• China Family Panel Studies (2010 and 2012)• Analytical Sample: people born before 1980.• Dependent variable

Whether cohabitated with the first marriage spouse before first marriage (1=yes).

• Explanatory variablesSocio-economic status: schooling yearsFamily background: father’s education and CCP

membershipInstitutional conditions: hukou and CCP

membership Economic development: county GDP per capital

• ControlsBirth cohort, ethnicity, sample region

Non-cohabitation Cohabitation Total (obs.)

Husband Education

Illiterate 94.3 5.7 100.0 (2507)Primary School 89.8 10.2 100.0 (2625)Middle School 85.1 14.9 100.0 (3432)High School 82.9 17.1 100.0 (1512)College and Above.

77.3 22.7 100.0 (784)

Wife Education

Illiterate 95.6 4.4 100.0 (4496)Primary School 86.8 13.2 100.0 (2257)Middle School 81.8 18.2 100.0 (2676)High School 81.0 19.0 100.0 (1148)College and Above.

74.5 25.5 100.0 (604)

Cohabitation before marriage by cohort of first marriage and education

(Xie et al. 2013)Cohort of first marriage

Non-cohabitation Cohabitation Total (obs.)

1970 prior 98.2 1.8 100.0 (1876)1970~1979 98.0 2.0 100.0 (1647)1980~1989 95.0 5.0 100.0 (2763)1990~1999 87.9 12.1 100.0 (2283)2000~2012 67.4 32.6 100.0 (2765)

  Male Female

Schooling years 0.018* 0.003

Father’s education (RG: Primary school)

   

Middle school 0.053 0.028

High school -0.087 0.361**

College 0.338 0.073

Missing 0.100 -0.056

Father’s CCP (RG: Non-CCP)

CCP members -0.112 -0.079

Missing 0.058 0.137

Urban hukou 0.246*** 0.177*

CCP member -0.230* -0.389*

County-level GDP per capital (10000RMB)

0.073*** 0.098***

Other variables controlled

N 14,862 15,148

Logit model for cohabitation experience before first marriage (Yu and Xie 2014)

Consequence for Divorce? (Cox model, Yu and Xie 2014)  Men Women

Cohabited before first marriage 0.514***a -0.091

  (0.149) (0.215)

Other variables controlled

Observations 12,862 13,158

It’s puzzling that the results differ between men and women. One possibility is that women may underreport divorce orCohabitation.

Consequence for Premarital Pregnancy? (logit model, Yu and

Xie 2014)   Men Women

Cohabited before first marriage 0.967*** 0.932***

  (0.104) (0.116)

Other variables controlled

Observations 12,862 13,158

  US China  Men Women Men Women

Determinants (different)        

Own SES Negative Negative PositiveNo

difference

Family background Negative NegativeNo

differencePositive

Urban residents No difference No difference Positive Positive

Political status No difference No difference Negative Negative

Economic development No difference No difference Positive Positive

Consequences (similar)        

Marital stability Negative Negative Negative Insignificant

Premarital childbearing Positive Positive Positive Positive

Summary: Differences and similarities and between China and US (Yu and Xie 2014)

Thank You!