Not a Zero-Sum Game: China s Internal Migration and the Wellbeing of Rural-origin Children

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2 Not a Zero-Sum Game: China s Internal Migration and the Wellbeing of Rural-origin Children Duoduo Xu PhD Candidate, Center for Applied Social and Economic Research (CASER) And Division of Social Science Hong Kong University of Science and Technology Clear Water Bay, Kowloon Hong Kong SAR, CHINA ( dxu@ust.hk) Jaap Dronkers Chair International Comparative Research on Educational Performance and Social Inequality Research Centre for Education and the Labour Market Maastricht University, the NETHERLANDS ( Jaap.Dronkers@EUI.eu) Xiaogang Wu Professor, Division of Social Science Director, Center for Applied Social and Economic Research (CASER) Hong Kong University of Science and Technology Clear Water Bay, Kowloon Hong Kong SAR, CHINA ( sowu@ust.hk) Population Studies Center Research Report March 2016 We acknowledge support from the Research Grants Council of Hong Kong via the General Research Fund for the project Consequences of Internal and Cross-border Migration in China for Children: A Mainland-Hong Kong Comparison (646411), granted to the third author (Wu), and the research facility from the Center for Applied Social and Economic Research, HKUST. Direct all correspondence to Duoduo Xu ( dxu@ust.hk) or Xiaogang Wu (sowu@ust.hk), Center for Applied Social and Economic Research (CASER), Hong Kong University of Science & Technology, Clear Water Bay, Kowloon, Hong Kong SAR.

3 China s Internal Migration and the Wellbeing of Rural-origin Children 2 Abstract Two-fifths of the 279 million children in China are directly affected by the on-going massive internal migration. Using data from a nationally representative survey covering junior high school students in both rural and urban areas, we examine the causal impacts of different migration processes (parental migration, child migration, and hukou conversion) on rural children s wellbeing measured by cognitive abilities, school engagement, school attachment, health, educational aspirations, and confidence about the future. Results from propensity score matching analysis show that migration brings both benefits and costs to children. Bringing rural children to cities significantly improved their school performance and physical health on the one hand, but also reduced their educational aspirations and increased their anxiety towards the future on the other hand. Leaving children behind in the countryside, while avoiding potential social exclusions in cities, results in a negative impact on their physical and mental health. Gaining local urban hukou status can improve rural-origin children s academic achievement to some extent, but has no effect on the other wellbeing indicators. These results reveal that the migration process per se and China s unique hukou system have generated both opportunities and challenges for children involved.

4 China s Internal Migration and the Wellbeing of Rural-origin Children 3 Introduction Since the 1990s, China has been experiencing the largest population migration in human history. Hundreds of millions of people have been moving from rural areas to urban areas for better work opportunities and life prospects. Their migration decisions have also brought transformative and fundamental impacts on rural families, especially their children. According to a research report based on the analysis of the 2010 population census, almost 36 million rural migrant children (aged 17 years or below) lived in cities; one third of all children (i.e., over 61 million) in the countryside were left behind by migrant parent(s), of which half were left behind by both parents (ACWF 2013). With such a huge number of children being involved in the migration process, it is both theoretically interesting and empirically important to investigate the impacts of migration on the wellbeing of children from rural China. Two groups of children are directly affected by China s internal migration process: those who moved to cities with their parents, and those who were left behind by migrant parents in the countryside. Despite a surge of interest in the wellbeing of these rural-origin children in recent years, most studies have yielded inconclusive findings, and the sociological explanations have been far from clear (Wu and Zhang 2015). Existing research on the impacts of migration on children suffer from three major limitations. First, most studies have not developed appropriate and complete comparison strategies. Following the assimilation theories in the study of international immigration, scholars would usually compare rural migrants with urban natives. However, this type of comparison reveals little about the causal impacts of migration per se. From a methodological perspective, as urban natives are not at risk of migration by definition, they cannot be seen as the counterparts of rural migrants (Xu and Xie 2015). Substantively, as migrants move from rural to urban areas for better life chances, their experiences of migration are perceived mainly in comparison to those from the same origins, instead of to those of locals in destinations (Zuccotti, Ganzeboom, and Guveli 2015). In addition, existing literature has seldom compared the experiences of migrant children and left-behind children. Indeed, the costs and benefits of bringing children to cities or leaving them behind in the countryside are evaluated by millions of rural families every year. Second, even those who adopted the origin-destination approach in their group comparison relied mostly on census data, with limited indicator (i.e., school enrollment) of children's wellbeing (Liang and Chen 2007; Wu and Zhang 2015). Existing evidence has pointed to the

5 China s Internal Migration and the Wellbeing of Rural-origin Children 4 complicated and multifaceted impacts of migration on a wide variety of child outcomes. For instance, Wu and Zhang (2015) found that rural migrant children are even less likely to be enrolled in schools than left-behind children, which begs the question of why migrant parents would bring along their children to cities in the first place. Holding a more optimistic view, Xu and Xie (2015) claimed positive effects of migration on children s objective wellbeing and no negative effects on their subjective wellbeing. However, what they cannot explain is why most migrant parents would still choose to leave their children behind in the countryside. These seemly contradictory findings indicate the inappropriateness of focusing on particular outcomes, which may lead to oversimplified interpretations. Last but not the least, although increasingly more studies have been devoted to identifying the signs and sizes of the so-called migration impacts, far less attention has been paid to the context and process through which these impacts are generated. China s internal migration process is closely linked to the specific socioeconomic and institutional context of the country. On one hand, the large rural-urban inequalities in resource distribution have motivated migrant parents to bring their children to cities for better education and health care; on the other hand, the hukou system and associated social exclusions in cities have forced the majority to leave their children behind in the countryside (Chan and Buckingham 2008; Chan and Zhang 1999; Wu and Treiman 2004; Xu and Wu 2015b). Presumably, given hukou s crucial role in resource distribution, we would expect rural-origin children who are able to obtain local urban hukou status to be better off than other migrant children whose hukou status remains unchanged even after migration. However, to our knowledge, the causal impacts of hukou conversion on rural-origin children s wellbeing have never been empirically examined. Without thoughtful discussion and careful investigation of the true meaning of migration for those involved and its underlying mechanisms, we would be looking at fragments of the story rather than a larger picture. The present study is an attempt to remedy this problem. Based on a comprehensive typology, we focus on the differences among four groups of rural-origin children: migrant children with and without a local hukou living in cities, and left-behind and non-migrant children living in the countryside. Specifically, we ask four research questions: (1) What are the actual gains for rural children from migrating to urban areas? (2) What are the consequences for migrant parents of leaving their children behind in the countryside? (3) more interestingly, between the two plausible migration strategies, which one benefits rural children more? (4) And finally, does obtaining a local urban hukou really payoff for rural-origin children? We investigate

6 China s Internal Migration and the Wellbeing of Rural-origin Children 5 these questions using nationally representative data from a school-based survey, covering junior high school students in both rural and urban China. We apply the propensity score matching method to the data to ensure different groups of rural children are intrinsically comparable. To reveal the benefits and costs involved in the migration process, we examine a wide gamut of child wellbeing domains, ranging from school performance, physical and mental health, to future aspirations. Findings in this paper bear important policy implications for related issues in China, and can also be linked to studies on temporal migration in other countries or regions across the world. Literature Review and Research Questions An important argument for migration by adults with children is the assumed better prospects of their children after a successful migration. However, whether children actually benefit from the migration experience remains a debatable question. China s internal migration is ideal for studying this issue, because in this case other factors often related to migration such as foreign citizenship, and language and cultural differences (Dronkers and De Heus 2013) are not relevant to a large extent. The long-existing rural-urban divide in China has encouraged some migrant parents to bring their children with them to the big cities, where the educational resources and health care facilities are far better than those available in their home villages. Figure 1 shows the huge difference in educational resources offered to junior high school students in Shanghai (a typical destination for migrants) and rural Henan (an important origin place of migrants). Xu and Xie (2015) found that rural-to-urban migration benefited migrant children in some life domains such as cognitive abilities and physical health. Recent studies from Western European countries also suggested better educational attainment of low-class migrants than their counterparts in their places of origin (Zuccotti, Ganzeboom, and Guveli 2015). Nevertheless, moving from rural to urban areas does not mean that migrant children will automatically benefit from the desirable infrastructure and resources in cities for two reasons. First, social welfares and benefits are often reserved for those with local hukou status (Chan and Buckingham 2008; Chan and Zhang 1999; Wu and Treiman 2004). Due to this institutional restriction, rural migrant children are less likely to be enrolled in local schools (Liang and Chen 2007; Liang, Guo, and Duan 2008; Wu and Zhang 2015). Even when admitted, they are either charged extra school fees (referred to as sponsorship fees zanzhu fei) or relegated to sub-standard schools (Chan and Buckingham 2008; Lu and Zhou 2013; Xu and Wu 2015b).

7 China s Internal Migration and the Wellbeing of Rural-origin Children 6 Second, as new comers, rural migrant children in cities are often treated as outsiders and inferiors. They suffer from peer pressure and mental stress, increasing their anxiety toward future prospects (Lu and Zhou 2013; Xiong 2015; Xu and Wu 2015b). For instance, Xiong (2015) demonstrated that, in Shanghai, most migrant children gave up their educational aspirations after realizing their chances of upward mobility are severely limited. Considering the complex influences involved in the child migration process, our first research question would be: What are the actual gains for rural children from migrating to urban areas? Figure 1. Educational Expenditure per Student in Junior High Schools Educational Expenditure per Student in Juunior high schools (Yuan) Ratio Year Country Avg. Rural Henan Shanghai Ratio: Shanghai/Rural Henan Data source: China Educational Finance Statistical Yearbook, The empirical findings on the wellbeing of left-behind children are even more mixed. Some studies have suggested that parent-child separation makes left-behind children extremely vulnerable, resulting in their low educational achievements (Hu 2012; Lu 2012; Zhao, Yu, Wang, and Glauben 2014), poor physical health and health-related behaviors (Gao, Li, Kim, Congdon, Lau, and Griffiths 2010; Li, Liu, and Zang 2015; Wen and Lin 2012), and psychological and developmental problems (Jia and Tian 2010; Wu, Lu, and Kang 2015). Other studies, however,

8 China s Internal Migration and the Wellbeing of Rural-origin Children 7 have shown that parental migration is not necessarily harmful for children s development (Chen, Huang, Rozelle, Shi, and Zhang 2009; Wen, Su, Li, and Lin 2015; Xu and Xie 2015). One possible explanation is that these children continue to be taken care of by their grandparents or other caregivers. Moreover, migrant parents would send remittances back home, so left-behind children would tend to have more material and financial resources to overcome constraints and increase their human capital investments than other rural children whose parents live in the countryside with them (Hu 2012; Mu and Brauw 2015). Since the vast majority of children in rural China are currently left behind by migrant parents, their livelihood and psychological states have caused widespread concern among the public. Therefore, our second research question is: What are the consequences for migrant parents of leaving their children behind in the countryside? Previous literature has largely neglected the fact that the migration process involves two steps for rural families with children. Rural parents would first have to decide whether or not to migrate, and then they must decide whether to bring their children along or leave them behind. Although the latter decision is made by millions of migrant parents in China, few studies have attempted to investigate its effect on the wellbeing of migrant and left-behind children. Liang and Chen (2007), Wu and Zhang (2015), the two exceptions, both focus on school enrollment using census data. They show a significantly higher risk of dropping out for migrant children who went along with their parents to cities. This may partially explain some migrant parents decision to leave their children behind in the countryside despite the pain and problems of family separation. For the first time, based on school-based data, we will adopt the origin-destination approach to investigate the third question: Between the two plausible migration strategies, which one benefits rural children more? A distinctive feature of China s internal migration is that, the hukou system has been acting constantly as an invisible barrier hindering migrants assimilation process, and forcing migrant parents to leave their children behind in the countryside. For example, entrance examinations of high schools and colleges must be taken in the locality of hukou registration and not in the

9 China s Internal Migration and the Wellbeing of Rural-origin Children 8 locality of residence, which means that migrant children must return to their hometown if they wish to pursue further studies. Therefore, the institutional barriers imposed by the hukou system are key to the migration strategies adopted by migrant families and their consequences for rural children in China. It is worth mentioning that, though rare, rural-origin children can actually obtain an urban hukou. Their hukou is converted once their parents meet certain criteria, 1 or when cities expand and their villages are incorporated into urban areas (Zhang and Treiman 2013). To the extent that the lack of a local hukou indeed puts rural migrant children at a disadvantage, we should observe better outcomes for those rural-origin migrant children who are able to convert their hukou status and gain local citizenship than for those who fail to do so. This speculation leads us to the last research question: Does obtaining a local urban hukou really pay off for rural-origin children? Analytical Framework and Hypotheses To answer the research questions raised in the previous section, it is necessary to develop a comprehensive typology of all the rural-origin children, as well as appropriate comparison strategies for causal assessment. A complete rural-to-urban migration in China generally consists of three processes: parental migration, child migration, and finally, hukou conversion. Figure 2 shows these three migration processes and also the resulting typology of rural-origin children. Note that these three processes follow a sequential order, rather than simply a temporal order. For instance, the decisions of parental migration and child migration may be made at the same time. As clearly suggested by the analytical framework, internal migration in China is a complicated process consisting of several phrases, so lumping different types of migration effects together will severely contaminate our empirical analysis and limit our understanding of their consequences. Because migrant parents may either bring their children with them to cities or leave them behind in the countryside, we are actually dealing with two different types of migration effects. 1 Mainly through attaining tertiary or technical secondary education, or joining the People s Liberation Army (Wu and Treiman 2004).

10 China s Internal Migration and the Wellbeing of Rural-origin Children 9 Figure 2. Migration Processes and Typology of Rural-origin Children Yes Parental Migration Child Migration Yes No Local Hukou Attainment No Yes No Converters Migrants Left-behinds Non-migrants One is the effect of parental migration, and the other is the effect of child migration (or family migration, since children can only migrate with their parents). Another type of migration process that is consistently neglected by scholars is the attainment of a local hukou, which is the final step of a successful migration. The value of migration is expected to be the largest for the group of rural-origin children who are able to gain a local hukou. It is therefore necessary to distinguish among these different types of migration patterns, and be specific about the group we are interested in and the reference group under different circumstances. Much of the migration/immigration study has been centered on how migrants/immigrants have fared compared with local natives, and measuring their success as the extent to which they have closed the socioeconomic gap with natives, and assimilated into destination societies. However, as criticized by Zuccotti, Ganzeboom, and Guveli (2015), this may not be the perspective that migrants themselves find most relevant. People do not move to compete with other groups in the destination society but to improve their life chances and their children s relative to what they would have been in the origin society. In addition, Xu and Xie

11 China s Internal Migration and the Wellbeing of Rural-origin Children 10 (2015) also pointed out that children from non-migrant families in rural areas are a more suitable reference group for migrant children as they are potentially exposable (Holland 1986) to migration experience. Therefore, to assess and understand the causal impacts of rural-to-urban migration on children s wellbeing, it is necessary to examine the benefits (or costs) for migrant children in destination cities compared to their non-migrant counterparts in the countryside or the left-behind children of migrated parents (Feliciano 2005; Zuccotti, Ganzeboom, and Guveli 2015). To sum up, for the purpose of examining the effect of parental migration on rural children, we contrast left-behind children with non-migrant children who both live in rural areas; to examine the effect of their own migration on rural children, we contrast migrant children in cities with non-migrant children in the countryside; to compare the two migration strategies of bringing their children along with them to cities and leaving them behind in the countryside, we contrast left-behind children with migrant children, using the latter as the reference group; finally, to assess the value of obtaining a local urban hukou, we contrast those rural-origin children who currently hold a local (urban) hukou with their peers who do not. Based on these comparison strategies for causal inferences, we propose several research hypotheses. Our focus on child developmental outcomes can be broadly divided into four domains: school performance, physical health, mental health, and future aspirations. Notably, one of the major contributions of this paper is that it attempts to uncover the impacts of migration on children s future aspirations. Studies have shown that higher aspirations often provide migrants with stronger motivations for upward mobility, and can partly explain their academic success despite their disadvantaged family socioeconomic background (Xu and Wu 2015a). If the destination society is more accepting of newcomers, migrants and their children would be more confident and would have higher hopes for their future. In turn, if migrant families experience segregation and discrimination in cities, they would exhibit a lower level of aspiration and feel more anxious toward their future. Therefore, rural children s future aspirations are arguably a direct reflection of their subjective feelings and attitudes toward migration, whether it involves their parents only or involves them as well.

12 China s Internal Migration and the Wellbeing of Rural-origin Children 11 Better educational resources and health care facilities in destination cities should benefit migrant children. But facing an unfamiliar environment and being subjected to institutional segregation and discrimination could generate extra psychological burdens on migrant children, even affecting their perceived life chances for upward mobility. Thus, we expect: H1: Compared to rural non-migrant children, migrant children in cities would enjoy some advantages in school performance and physical health, but also face some disadvantages in mental health and future aspirations. Parent-child separation could result in a lack of love and care and parental supervision, and hence could be harmful for children s schooling and health. However, the remittances sent back by migrant parents could significantly increase family income and children s education opportunities. Therefore, we would expect disruptive effects of parental migration on left-behind children s physical and mental health, but mixed results for their school performance. Also, as these left-behind children are not directly exposed to segregation and discrimination in cities as their migrant peers are, they may not necessarily have lower future aspirations. Thus, we expect: H2: Compared to their non-migrant counterparts, left-behind children in rural areas would enjoy some but limited advantages in school performance and future aspirations, but they would be disadvantaged in physical and mental health. It is just as difficult for a migrant from rural China to obtain a local urban hukou as it is for an illegal migrant in the US to obtain a green card. With a local urban hukou, we would expect the children of successful rural migrants to outperform rural migrant children in cities without a local urban hukou in terms of school performance, and to also have higher future aspirations, because the former face far less institutional boundaries. However they are still subject to all the stresses and strains of the migration process. H3: Compared to rural migrant children without a local hukou, rural-origin children who successfully obtain a local hukou would enjoy advantages in school performance and future aspirations, but the two groups of children would not exhibit any differences in terms of physical and mental health. As for the comparison between migrant children and left-behind children, we do not lay out any prior assumptions because of a lack of theoretical conjectures and empirical evidence in the previous literature. Table 1 clearly demonstrates the hypothetical benefits and costs that parental/child migration and hukou conversion bring to different aspects of child wellbeing.

13 China s Internal Migration and the Wellbeing of Rural-origin Children 12 Table 1. Hypothetical Benefits and Costs of the Migration Process on Selected Child Development Domains Child migration (Migrants vs. Non-migrants) Parental Migration (Left-behinds vs. Non-migrants) Local Hukou Attainment (Converters vs. Migrants) School performance + +/- + Physical health + - +/- Mental health - - +/- Future aspirations - +/- + Data, Variables, and Methods Data The empirical analysis is based on data from the first wave of the 2014 China Education Panel Survey (CEPS), 2 a nationally representative school-based survey on junior high school students in China. Employing a multi-stage stratified PPS sampling design, the survey first selected 28 counties/districts across the country, and then sampled four junior high schools within the geographic boundaries of each county/district. For each school, four classes (two 7 th grade classes and two 9 th grade classes) were sampled, and all of the students within each class would enter the survey. Overall, the survey covered approximately 20,000 students in 112 schools from both urban and rural regions, enabling us to locate rural students in both origins and destinations. Moreover, designed deliberately to focus on migrant children, the survey also oversampled those counties/districts with large in-migrant populations. Particularly, we would like to highlight the fact that this was a school-based survey, which suggests only children who were officially enrolled in schools were sampled. Considering that rural migrant children in cities had a higher dropout rate (Liang and Chen 2007; Wu and Zhang 2015), this group tended to be positively selected in our sample. We are aware of this data limitation, and will discuss the implications for our findings in the conclusion. In this paper, our primary interest is the impact of parental or child migration, as well as hukou conversion, on rural children s/students wellbeing outcomes. Hence, our analytic sample consists of four groups of rural-origin children: children who migrate with their parents and 2

14 China s Internal Migration and the Wellbeing of Rural-origin Children 13 successfully acquire a local hukou; children who migrate with their parents but fail to acquire a local hukou; children who are left behind by migrant parents; and non-migrant children who are not exposed to any direct influence of migration. Informed by previous research, we define rural-to-urban migrant children (N=1,769) as those who currently live in urban areas while holding a non-local rural hukou (excluding those moving across district boundaries within the city); we define hukou converters (N=150) as those who were born with a non-local rural hukou but currently hold a local urban hukou. Both left-behind children (N=1,246) and non-migrant children (N=3,549) are local rural hukou holders in rural areas. Left-behind children do not live with their parents, and at least one of their parents is engaged in non-farm work. 3 Any other groups that do not fall into one of these four categories are excluded from our sample. Variables Considering the complex influences of migration on children s wellbeing, we examine a variety of child developmental outcomes, rather than focusing on one particular aspect. School performance is one of the most important domains of child development. We adopt three related measures for this outcome. First, cognitive abilities are measured by standardized scores from a 15-minute in-class assessment on students learned reasoning abilities in three areas most linked to academic success in school: verbal, numerical, and graphical. Second, school engagement is measured by the number of hours that students spend on homework on an average day (including weekdays and weekends). Third, school attachment is measured by scores derived from a 12-item scale asking about students feelings and experiences of school life. Health is another essential domain of child development. We measure physical health based on a five-point Likert scale of students health status, 4 and also measure mental health using the standard five-item depression scale widely used by other scholars. In addition, we also adopt two measures to capture the influences of migration on rural children s perceived life chances: educational aspirations and confidence about the future. 3 We adopt this alternative measure, as we do not have information on parents current place of residence. 4 The values of this variable are based on responses made by the parents (or any other caregivers who completed the questionnaire for parents). If missing, we use students own responses instead.

15 China s Internal Migration and the Wellbeing of Rural-origin Children 14 We also consider a wide range of individual characteristics and family background as control variables. The individual characteristics include four dummy variables: students sex (male=1), grade level (9 th grade=1), ethnicity (minority=1), and prior achievement (ever repeated a grade during primary school=1). In addition, age is coded into five categories (12, 13, 14, 15, 16). Furthermore, the model also includes several variables on family background. Place of origin is coded into four categories (east, northeast, central, west), parental education is coded into three categories (primary or lower, junior high, senior high or above), number of siblings is coded into four categories (0, 1, 2, 3 or above), family economic status before primary school is a dummy variable (poor=1), 2 family cultural capital is measured by the number of books at home, which is a categorical variable (very few, few, moderate, many, a lot). Table 2 shows the descriptive statistics on the aforementioned variables by rural families migration status. As shown in the table, hukou converters outperform the other three groups of rural-origin children on most of the wellbeing domains, especially cognitive abilities. However, their family background is also significantly better than that of other groups, so it is not clear whether or not hukou conversion has a net advantage after controlling for other factors. Apart from this highly selected group, rural migrant children seem to be better off than their counterparts in origins, particularly in terms of school performance and physical health. There seems to be no systematic differences between left-behind children and non-migrant children in rural areas in terms of both children s outcomes and family background. Nevertheless, we do find that left-behind children have the worst physical and mental health among all four groups of children. Methods Any migration decision is selective in essence (Borjas 1987). The four groups of rural-origin children are not directly comparable, because their developmental outcomes can be simultaneously affected by migration status and other individual or family characteristics. For instance, rural families with better economic resources or social capital are more likely to overcome institutional obstacles and successfully send their children to high-quality urban

16 China s Internal Migration and the Wellbeing of Rural-origin Children 15 Table 2. Descriptive Statistics on Selected Variables, by Migration Status Converters Migrants Left-behinds Non-migrants Outcomes Cognitive abilities 0.293(0.731) (0.852) (0.728) (0.751) Hours/day spent on 3.030(1.299) 2.585(1.446) 2.542(1.711) 2.458(1.682) homework Attachment to school 2.164(0.326) 2.169(0.347) 2.120(0.355) 2.158(0.348) Health 4.287(0.789) 4.216(0.860) 3.902(0.872) 3.962(0.906) Depression 2.038(0.903) 2.085(0.831) (0.767) 2.143(0.699) Educational aspirations 5.573(1.961) 5.414(2.033) 5.421(2.084) 5.365(2.055) Confidence about future 3.306(0.727) 3.163(0.712) 3.099(0.729) 3.163(0.726) Individual characteristics Male 0.520(0.501) 0.509(0.500) 0.549(0.498) 0.512(0.500) Age 13.75(1.158) 13.92(1.226) 13.97(1.288) 14.14(1.272) Grade (9 th =1) 0.493(0.502) 0.397(0.489) 0.473(0.499) 0.526(0.499) Minority (yes=1) 0.040(0.197) 0.054(0.225) 0.129(0.336) 0.133(0.340) Grade retention (yes=1) 0.047(0.212) 0.204(0.403) 0.364(0.481) 0.291(0.454) Family background Place of origin East 0.680(0.468) (0.483) 0.005(0.069) 0.001(0.034) Northeast 0.033(0.180) 0.057(0.231) 0.026(0.161) 0.102(0.303) Central 0.000(0.000) 0.271(0.445) 0.544(0.498) 0.483(0.500) West 0.287(0.454) 0.303(0.460) 0.425(0.494) 0.413(0.493) Parental education Primary or lower 0.013(0.115) 0.125(0.331) 0.160(0.366) 0.168(0.374) Junior high 0.320(0.468) 0.558(0.497) 0.588(0.492) 0.613(0.487) Senior high and above 0.667(0.473) 0.317(0.465) 0.252(0.434) 0.219(0.413) No. of siblings (0.501) 0.276(0.447) 0.165(0.371) 0.192(0.394) (0.487) 0.523(0.500) 0.571(0.495) 0.592(0.491) (0.272) 0.155(0.362) 0.220(0.414) 0.170(0.375) 3 and above 0.007(0.082) 0.046(0.209) 0.044(0.205) 0.046(0.210) Poor family (yes=1) 0.233(0.424) 0.289(0.453) 0.460(0.499) 0.499(0.500) No. of Books at home Very few 0.013(0.115) 0.105(0.306) (0.432) 0.241(0.428) Few 0.073(0.262) 0.134(0.341) 0.242(0.429) 0.224(0.417) Moderate 0.387(0.489) 0.395(0.489) 0.356(0.479) 0.380(0.485) Many 0.313(0.465) 0.239(0.426) 0.128(0.334) 0.116(0.320) A lot 0.213(0.411) 0.128(0.335) 0.027(0.163) 0.039(0.195) N Note: Standard deviations are in parentheses.

17 China s Internal Migration and the Wellbeing of Rural-origin Children 16 schools, therefore it is not clear whether better educational outcomes of migrant children are due to the migration per se or family resources. Reverse causality could also be a problem, considering that some migrant parents may strategically choose to bring the smarter (or healthier) children with them to cities for better educational opportunities, and leave the not-so-smart (or not-so-healthy) ones behind to reduce costs. To address these endogeneity concerns, scholars would adopt either the instrumental variable approach (Hu 2012; Zhao, Yu, Wang, and Glauben 2014) or the propensity score matching approach (Chen et al. 2009; Xu and Xie 2015). In this paper, we use the latter. 5 All of the individual and family characteristics we mentioned in the previous section are incorporated into the propensity score matching analysis as matching covariates. After estimating the propensity scores, we proceed to match the treatment group and the control group. Particularly, we choose the optimal (full) matching method for its two desirable features over other matching methods. First, most matching algorithms involve a series of small decisions, and these decisions are made one at a time without reconsidering earlier decisions (Rosenbaum 2002). This process makes final results sensitive to arbitrary decisions such as choosing caliper sizes, or deciding bandwidth values and trimming schedules; it also makes the quality of the matches sensitive to the order in which treated subjects are matched. By applying network flow theory, optimal matching can avoid this issue by taking into account the overall set of matches when choosing individual matches. In other words, in the optimal matching process, later decisions can alter earlier ones. Specifically, optimal matching aims to develop matched sets in such a way that the matching can optimize or minimize the total distance of propensity scores (Guo and Fraser 2014). For optimal full matching 6, each treated case is matched to one or more controls, and similarly, each control case is matched to one or more treated subjects. 5 We also conduct naïve OLS regression analysis, and results are reported in the Appendix. 6 The other two types of optimal matching methods are pair matching and variable matching. However, they are generally not optimal when compared to full matching using the same data (Rosenbaum 2002). Nonetheless we also tried pair matching and variable matching. The imbalance check results show that full matching performed the best among the three.

18 China s Internal Migration and the Wellbeing of Rural-origin Children 17 Second, the use of most matching algorithms requires considerable overlapping of estimated propensity scores for treatment and control groups. Violation of this overlap assumption is a major source of evaluation bias (Heckman, Ichimura, and Todd 1997). However, optimal matching does not require a sizable common support region to work (Guo and Fraser 2014). Following the well-established implementation steps suggested by scholars (Caliendo and Kopeinig 2008), once the propensity scores are estimated, we first show the density distribution of propensity scores for both treatment and control group to check the overlap between the two. As can be seen in the Appendix, it is likely that the problem of a narrow common support region under some circumstances would produce a nontrivial loss of matched subjects if we use greedy matching or kernel-based matching. This justifies our use of the optimal matching method, as we are not made to drop subjects falling outside the range of the common support region, or to use a trimming strategy to discard sparse subjects with extreme propensity scores. How do we evaluate the effectiveness of such matching methods? According to Haviland, Nagin, and Rosenbaum (2007), the level of bias reduction can be calculated by comparing the absolute standardized differences in covariate means before and after optimal matching. The imbalance on covariate X is measured by dd xx before matching and by dd xxmm after matching. The formulas are dd xx = MM xxxx MM xxxx (SS 2 xxxx + SS 2 xxxx ) 2 dd xxxx = MM xxxx MM xxxx (SS 2 xxxx + SS 2 xxxx ) 2 where subscripts t, p, and c denote the treatment group, the potential control group, and the control group, respectively. So MM xxxx and MM xxxx are the means of covariate X for the treatment group and the potential control group, and MM xxxx is the unweighted mean of means of X for the controls matched to treated cases. The denominator is the overall standard deviation of the mean values. dd xx and dd xxxx can be interpreted as the differences in standard deviation of X between the treatment and control groups, and thus are directly comparable (Guo and Fraser 2014).

19 China s Internal Migration and the Wellbeing of Rural-origin Children 18 Results Matching We first compare migrant children with non-migrant children to examine the effects of child migration (with migrant children being the treatment group), before comparing left-behind children with non-migrant children to examine the effects of parental migration (with left-behind children being the treatment group). Then, we compare left-behind children with migrant children to examine the consequences of leaving children behind (with left-behind children being the treatment group). Finally, we compare hukou converters with other rural-migrant children without a local hukou to examine the benefits of hukou conversion (with hukou converters being the treatment group). When comparing left-behind children with migrant children, we are actually speculating about how a left-behind child would have performed had he or she been brought to cities with their migrant parents (i.e., not receiving the treatment). Table 3 reports the sample description and bivariate test on variables for four comparison scenarios, and Table 4 presents the logistic regressions predicting the propensity scores. Although many interesting results are presented in this table, we cannot go through each of the comparisons due to limited space. Instead, we take the comparison of two migration strategies (i.e., leaving children behind or bringing them to cities) as an example. Specifically, we find that boys and girls are equally likely to be left behind in the countryside. That is to say, there is no evidence of son preference in migrant parents arrangement for their children. 7 Other things being equal, older or higher grade rural children are more likely to be left behind. This result makes sense considering the fact that, although cities are responsible for providing nine-year compulsory education for migrant children (as required by state policy introduced in 2001), 8 they have no obligations to admit them into local senior high schools. 7 However, since only enrolled students were sampled in our survey and if more migrant boys dropped out of urban schools than migrant girls (because they have a higher chance of earning money in unskilled work than migrant girls), it can also explain the insignificant gender difference we observed. 8 Guowuyuan Guanyu Jichu Jiaoyu Gaige yu Fazhan de Jueding ( State Council s Decisions on Reforms and Development of Basic Education ), 29 May, 2001.

20 China s Internal Migration and the Wellbeing of Rural-origin Children 19 Table 3. Sample Description and Bivariate Test of Variables Migrants vs. Non-migrants Left-behinds vs. Non-migrants Left-behinds vs. Migrants Hukou Converters vs. Migrants % of treated Bivariate χχ 2 test % of treated Bivariate χχ 2 test % of treated Bivariate χχ 2 test % of treated Bivariate χχ 2 test Gender Female Male Age Grade th grade th grade Minority No Yes Grade retention No Yes Place of origin East Northeast Central West Parental education Primary or lower Junior high Senior high and above No. of siblings and above Poor family

21 China s Internal Migration and the Wellbeing of Rural-origin Children 20 No Yes No. of Books at home Very few Few Moderate Many A lot N 5,318 4,795 3,015 1,439 Children with poor prior academic performance (grade repeaters) are less likely to be brought to cities, suggesting rural parents do make strategic migration decisions based on their children s educational and earning potential. Minorities and those originating from central or western regions are far more likely to be left behind, probably due to the longer traveling distance to destination cities. Surprisingly, parental education has no net influence on children s migration status, 9 while a family s cultural capital (number of books at home) significantly increases the probability of child migration. Children with more siblings are usually left behind, probably because migrants with more children are less likely to bring all of their children with them because of the high living costs in cities. A family s economic condition is also an essential factor. Poor families tend to leave their children at home as they cannot afford the extra costs of bringing them to cities. As Table 5 shows, the covariate imbalances are greatly reduced for almost all the variables, suggesting that optimal full matching worked reasonably well, and efficiently balanced the treated samples and control samples. Taking the poor family indicator in the comparison between left-behinds and migrants as an example, the treatment and control groups differ on this variable by more than 38 percent of a standard deviation before matching, whereas the standard bias is reduced to only 0.9 percent after full matching. 9 However, we do observe a significant positive effect of parental educational attainment on hukou conversion. This is consistent with the common wisdom that tertiary education is probably one of the most important pathways for acquiring a local urban hukou.

22 China s Internal Migration and the Wellbeing of Rural-origin Children 21 Table 4. Logistic Regression Models Predicting Propensity Scores Migrants vs. Non-migrants Left-behinds vs. Non-migrants Left-behinds vs. Migrants Hukou Converters vs. Migrants Male * Age (ref: 12) *** 0.727* 0.296*** *** 0.626** 0.225*** 0.226*** *** 0.523* 0.119*** 0.209** *** 0.424* 0.073*** 0.099*** Grade (9 th grade=1) 0.279*** *** 6.521*** Minority 0.313* * Grade retention (yes=1) ** 2.362*** Place of origin (ref: east) Northeast 0.001*** 0.075*** *** 0.264** Central 0.002*** 0.298* *** - West 0.002*** *** 0.471* Parental education (ref: primary or lower) Junior high * Senior high and above *** No. of siblings (ref: 0) ** * 0.465*** ** 0.460* 3 and above * Poor family (yes=1) 0.541*** 0.791** 1.610*** No. of Books at home (ref: very few) Few Moderate 2.018** ** 5.012* Many 3.951*** *** 5.148* A lot 6.253*** *** 5.552* Constant *** *** 0.009*** N 5,318 4,795 3,015 1,439 Note: Coefficients are odds ratios; robust standard errors adjusted for the clustering effect on schools are not reported; *** p<0.001, ** p<0.01, * p<0.05.

23 China s Internal Migration and the Wellbeing of Rural-origin Children 22 Table 5. Covariate Imbalance Check between Treatment and Control Groups, before and after Optimal Full Matching Migrants vs. Non-migrants Left-behinds vs. Non-migrants Left-behinds vs. Migrants Hukou Converters vs. Migrants dd xx dd xxxx dd xx dd xxxx dd xx dd xxxx dd xx dd xxxx Before matching After matching Before matching After matching Before matching After matching Before matching After matching Male Age Grade Minority Grade retention Place of origin East Northeast Central West Parental education Primary or lower Junior high Senior high and above No. of siblings

24 China s Internal Migration and the Wellbeing of Rural-origin Children and above Poor family No. of Books at home Very few Few Moderate Many A lot Note: dd xx and dd xxxx are absolute standardized differences in covariate means between the treatment group and the control group, dd xx for use before matching and dd xxxx for use after matching. Table 6. Estimated Treatment Effects on Various Outcomes after Optimal Full Matching Migrants vs. Non-migrants Left-behinds vs. Non-migrants Left-behinds vs. Migrants Hukou Converters vs. Migrants ATE P-value ATE P-value ATE P-value ATE P-value Cognitive abilities Hours/day spent on homework Attachment to school Health Depression Educational aspirations Confidence about future Note: The P-values are derived from the Hodges-Lehmann aligned rank tests (one-tailed). ATEs are standardized mean differences between the treatment group and the control group after matching.

25 China s Internal Migration and the Wellbeing of Rural-origin Children 24 Causal Impacts of Migration on Child Wellbeing When X is the outcome variable of interest, dd xxxx is also recognized as the average treatment effect (ATE) after optimal matching. The significance of the ATE is revealed by performing the Hodges-Lehmann aligned rank test (Lehmann and D'Abrera 2006). Table 6 summarizes the estimated treatment effects on child developmental outcomes after optimal full matching. 1. Do Rural Children Benefit from Migration to Cities? As shown in Table 6, moving from the countryside to cities does generate some beneficial outcomes for rural children as we would expect. Their cognitive abilities test scores are higher than those of non-migrants by close to 30 percent of a standard deviation; their time spent on homework is longer by almost 10 percent of a standard deviation; and their health is better by 22 percent of a standard deviation. But these benefits also come with a price. Being treated as outsiders and inferiors, migrant children in cities often face major challenges in the local education system, such as admission discrimination (Goodburn 2009; Wu and Zhang 2015), counter-school culture (Xiong 2015), and loneliness (Lu and Zhou 2013). A study relying on the same data (Xu and Wu 2015b) showed that hukou-based school segregation has largely driven migrant children to sub-standard schools and exposed them to various negative peer influences. Our results here further confirm that these factors could bring adverse impacts on migrant children s future aspirations, once they realize they have few opportunities for upward mobility. Their educational aspirations are lower than those of non-migrants by more than 7 percent of a standard deviation, and their confidence about the future is lower by approximately 17 percent of a standard deviation. These findings are in line with our first research hypothesis, and support the classic assumption that migrants are motivated to achieve a better life for themselves and their children. 2. Does being Left Behind in the Countryside Hurt Children s Wellbeing? With regard to the effects of parental migration on the wellbeing of those left behinds, previous literature has argued for both the negative effects resulting from parent-child separation (Gao et

26 China s Internal Migration and the Wellbeing of Rural-origin Children 25 al. 2010; Wu, Lu, and Kang 2015) and the positive effects resulting from remittances (Hu 2012; Mu and Brauw 2015). However, based on empirical evidence, money cannot compensate for parental affection. As Table 6 shows, contrary to people s expectation, the remittances sent back by migrant parents do not improve rural children s school performance by much. Although left-behind children spend slightly more time on homework than their non-migrant peers (by approximately 8 percent of a standard deviation), they do not show significantly higher cognitive abilities. Even worse, they tend to exhibit weaker attachment to schools (by close to 10 percent of a standard deviation), which is not a good sign, as weak school attachment is often closely related to higher rates of dropping out (South, Haynie, and Bose 2007). These results suggest that even if remittances could bring some benefits for rural children, it is likely that these positive effects are more or less offset by the adverse effects of family separation. For instance, among left-behind children, the level of depression is significantly higher by 7 percent of a standard deviation, and the physical health is also worse by approximately 6 percent of a standard deviation. Interestingly, even though left-behind children are not directly exposed to migration experience themselves, like migrant children, they also show lower confidence about the future albeit to a less extent (by approximately 10 percent of a standard deviation). This finding is somewhat ironic, as migration is initially motivated by people s desire to find better life chances yet somehow it ends up smashing their dreams and increasing their anxiety toward the future. Therefore, our second research hypothesis is only partially supported. 3.To Go or Not to Go? Millions of Chinese migrant parents face the dilemma of whether to bring their children with them to cities or to leave them behind in the countryside. Which of the two migration strategies would benefit their children more? Results in Table 6 reveal that it is not a simple zero-sum game for rural families. Using rural-origin migrant children as the comparison group, children who were left behind show significant and nontrivial disadvantages in terms of school performance. They score approximately 28 percent of a standard deviation lower in cognitive abilities tests, spend 2.5 percent of a standard deviation less effort on homework, and are less attached to

27 China s Internal Migration and the Wellbeing of Rural-origin Children 26 schools by approximately 10 percent of a standard deviation. These findings are not surprising, considering that the education resources and quality of schools in cities are much better than those in rural areas. Similarly, we also observe a sizable gap in physical health between left-behind children and migrant children by over 30 percent of a standard deviation. Better health care facilities in cities and better care given by parents could both contribute to migrant children s superior health conditions. However, these two groups perform quite similarly in terms of mental health and future aspirations, probably because they have all come across psychological and developmental difficulties one way or another. To sum up, as the evidence demonstrates, more migrant parents would bring their children to cities than not. 4. Does Local Hukou Payoff? In addition to the financial and psychological costs associated with migration, migrant children in urban China suffer additional disadvantages from the institutional barriers set by the hukou system. An easy way to directly see the payoffs of obtaining a local hukou status is to contrast those rural-origin children who successfully converted their hukou to those who failed to do so. We would expect better school performance and future aspirations for the former group, because they face far less institutional obstacles in cities. However, the propensity score matching results in Table 6 show that except for some advantage in cognitive abilities for hukou converters (arguably due to their greater chances of getting into high quality local schools), these two groups actually do not differ significantly in most wellbeing measures (although the signs of the effects are in line with our prediction). The relatively small sample size is of course a limitation, but the other plausible explanation is that these converters are a fairly heterogeneous group as it consists of children with very successful parents and also children originating from ordinary rural families who were lucky enough to obtain local urban hukou through village incorporation. Whatever the explanation is for the few differences between hukou converters and non-converters, it suggests that the formal acquisition of a local urban hukou can only partially compensate for the problems associated with migrating from rural to urban areas in China (Zhang and Wu 2013).

28 China s Internal Migration and the Wellbeing of Rural-origin Children 27 Conclusions and Discussion With one-sixth of its population on the move and two-fifths of its children being directly affected, China s internal migration has been continually shaping the country s future in a quiet but irreversible manner. The wellbeing and life prospects of these rural-origin children have become important public agendas for scholars and policymakers. Despite mounting interest in this topic, relevant studies have been inconclusive, largely because they only focused on certain phases or aspects of the whole migration process. In this article, based on a nationally representative survey on Chinese junior high students in both rural and urban areas, we developed a comprehensive analytic framework to investigate the impacts of migration. Specifically, we identified three important steps of the migration process: parental migration, child migration, and hukou conversion. Based on these steps, we classified four groups of rural-origin children: hukou converters and migrants who live in cities, and left-behinds and non-migrants who live in the countryside. Four comparison strategies were employed accordingly for causal inferences, and hypotheses were examined on diverse child wellbeing domains including school performance, physical and mental health, and future aspirations. We assessed the impacts of child migration by contrasting migrants with non-migrants, and the impacts of parental migration by contrasting left-behinds with non-migrants. Moreover, we further contrasted left-behinds with migrants to evaluate the relative benefits (or costs) of these two migration strategies, and contrasted hukou converters with migrants to evaluate the value of obtaining a local hukou. As migration is a process full of selection, to ensure the comparability of different groups of rural-origin children, we employed a propensity score matching method. Specifically, optimal full matching was chosen for its methodological superiority over other matching methods. Results after propensity score matching demonstrated that both benefits and costs are involved in the migration process. First, rural migrant children do benefit from better educational resources and health care facilities offered in cities. Migrant children have significantly better school performance and physical health than their non-migrant peers remaining in the countryside. However, the migration experience per se, and possibly the negative peer influences

29 China s Internal Migration and the Wellbeing of Rural-origin Children 28 resulting from hukou-based segregation, have greatly reduced migrant children s educational aspirations and increased their anxiety toward the future. On the other hand, although leaving children behind in the countryside means they will not be exposed to the adverse influences from the migration experience and institutional obstacles in cities, it does generate severely negative impacts on their physical and mental health when they are separated from their parents for long periods of time. Taken together, migrating with parents to cities does seem to be the preferable choice, as migrant children clearly enjoy large premiums in school performance and physical health. Nevertheless, as pointed out before, a major limitation of our data is that only officially enrolled children were sampled in this school-based survey. As informed by other research using census data (Liang and Chen 2007; Wu and Zhang 2015), the dropout rate is significantly higher for migrant children than left-behind children, and this will no doubt add to migrant parents concerns when deciding whether or not to bring their children to cities. Finally, even with the relatively small sample size and large within-group heterogeneity, we were still able to observe significant gains in academic achievement among hukou converters compared to the other rural migrant children. An important mechanism, we presume, is less school segregation. By successfully converting their hukou status, this group of rural-origin migrant children does not face institutional discrimination when entering high quality local schools, resulting in better academic achievements. In fact, we would even expect significantly a higher enrollment rate for hukou converters than other rural migrants, although we not have data on school enrollment to verify this hypothesis. We therefore conclude that although leaving their children behind appears to be a less wise choice for migrant parents, the many uncertainties and risks pertaining to the migration process, as well as various institutional barriers posed by the hukou system, combine to strongly dissuade parents from bringing their children along to destination cities. Obtaining a local urban hukou may promote rural-origin children s assimilation into local societies by offering them better educational opportunities, but it does not shield them from the other negative side-effects of the migration experience. The migration process poses both opportunities and challenges for rural

30 China s Internal Migration and the Wellbeing of Rural-origin Children 29 families, and trade-offs are inevitable in various migration decisions. There are no simple answers to complicated questions. Thus in the assessment of migration s positive and negative effects on rural children s wellbeing, any over-generalized conclusion should be avoided.

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34 China s Internal Migration and the Wellbeing of Rural-origin Children 33 Appendix Table A1. Naïve OLS Regression Models Predicting Differences in Various Outcomes between Migrant Children and Non-migrant Children (1) (2) (3) (5) (4) (6) (7) Cognitive abilities Hours/day spent on homework Attachment to school Health Depression Educational aspirations Confidence about future Treatment 0.227** *** *** (migrants=1) (0.070) (0.097) (0.016) (0.042) (0.036) (0.127) (0.031) Controls Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Constant ** 2.595*** 2.036*** 3.884*** 2.096*** 5.582*** 3.189*** (0.100) (0.165) (0.032) (0.079) (0.073) (0.181) (0.064) Observations 5,318 5,027 5,293 5,317 5,205 5,318 5,286 R-squared Notes: Robust standard errors adjusted for the clustering effect on schools are in parentheses; controls include age, gender, school grade, minority, region of origin, grade retention during primary school, highest level of parental education, number of siblings, family finance situation before primary school, and number of books at home; *** p<0.001, ** p<0.01, * p<0.05.

35 China s Internal Migration and the Wellbeing of Rural-origin Children 34 Table A2. Naïve OLS Regression Models Predicting Differences in Various Outcomes between Left-behind Children and Non-migrant Children (1) (2) (4) (5) (3) (6) (7) Cognitive abilities Hours/day spent on homework Attachment to school Health Depression Educational aspirations Confidence about future Treatment * * * (left-behinds=1) (0.031) (0.077) (0.011) (0.031) (0.027) (0.095) (0.027) Controls Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Constant *** 1.933*** 3.904*** 2.146*** 5.302*** 2.801*** (0.119) (0.420) (0.130) (0.286) (0.154) (0.629) (0.161) Observations 4,795 4,550 4,774 4,794 4,682 4,795 4,765 R-squared Notes: Robust standard errors adjusted for the clustering effect on schools are in parentheses; controls include age, gender, school grade, minority, region of origin, grade retention during primary school, highest level of parental education, number of siblings, family finance situation before primary school, and number of books at home; *** p<0.001, ** p<0.01, * p<0.05.

36 China s Internal Migration and the Wellbeing of Rural-origin Children 35 Table A3. Naïve OLS Regression Models Predicting Differences in Various Outcomes between Left-behind Children and Migrant Children (1) (2) (4) (5) (3) (6) (7) Cognitive abilities Hours/day spent on homework Attachment to school Health Depression Educational aspirations Confidence about future Treatment * *** (left-behinds=1) (0.076) (0.129) (0.020) (0.046) (0.046) (0.149) (0.039) Controls Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Constant *** 2.032*** 4.010*** 2.110*** 5.043*** 3.100*** (0.111) (0.177) (0.035) (0.089) (0.079) (0.253) (0.070) Observations 3,015 2,839 2,995 3,015 2,955 3,015 2,987 R-squared Notes: Robust standard errors adjusted for the clustering effect on schools are in parentheses; controls include age, gender, school grade, minority, region of origin, grade retention during primary school, highest level of parental education, number of siblings, family finance situation before primary school, and number of books at home; *** p<0.001, ** p<0.01, * p<0.05.

37 China s Internal Migration and the Wellbeing of Rural-origin Children 36 Table A4. Naïve OLS Regression Models Predicting Differences in Various Outcomes between Hukou Converters and Migrant Children (1) (2) (3) (4) (5) (6) (7) Cognitive abilities Hours/day spent on homework Attachment to school Health Depression Educational aspirations Confidence about future Treatment (converters=1) (0.086) (0.143) (0.029) (0.077) (0.075) (0.171) (0.062) Controls Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Constant *** 2.075*** 4.101*** 2.094*** 4.551*** 3.056*** (0.137) (0.192) (0.049) (0.106) (0.106) (0.351) (0.091) Observations 1,919 1,801 1,907 1,919 1,887 1,919 1,901 R-squared Notes: Robust standard errors adjusted for the clustering effect on schools are in parentheses; controls include age, gender, school grade, minority, region of origin, grade retention during primary school, highest level of parental education, number of siblings, family finance situation before primary school, and number of books at home; *** p<0.001, ** p<0.01, * p<0.05.

38 China s Internal Migration and the Wellbeing of Rural-origin Children 37 Histograms of Estimated Propensity Scores Density Non-migrant Children Density Migrant Children Boxplots of Estimated Propensity Scores Propensity Scores Non-migrant Children Migrant Children Figure A1. Histograms and Boxplots of Estimated Propensity Scores for Migrant Children and Non-migrant Children

39 China s Internal Migration and the Wellbeing of Rural-origin Children 38 Histograms of Estimated Propensity Scores Density Non-migrant Children Density Left-behind Children Boxplots of Estimated Propensity Scores Propensity Scores Non-migrant Children Left-behind Children Figure A2. Histograms and Boxplots of Estimated Propensity Scores for Left-behind Children and Non-migrant Children

40 China s Internal Migration and the Wellbeing of Rural-origin Children 39 Histograms of Estimated Propensity Scores Density Migrant Children Density Left-behind Children Boxplots of Estimated Propensity Scores Propensity Scores Migrant Children Left-behind Children Figure A3. Histograms and Boxplots of Estimated Propensity Scores for Left-behind Children and Migrant Children

41 China s Internal Migration and the Wellbeing of Rural-origin Children 40 Histograms of Estimated Propensity Scores Density Migrant Children Density Hukou Converters Boxplots of Estimated Propensity Scores Propensity Scores Migrant Children Hukou Converters Figure A4. Histograms and Boxplots of Estimated Propensity Scores for Hukou Converters and Migrant Children

42 PSC Research Reports The Population Studies Center (PSC) at the University of Michigan is one of the oldest population centers in the United States. Established in 1961 with a grant from the Ford Foundation, the Center has a rich history as the main workplace for an interdisciplinary community of scholars in the field of population studies. Currently PSC is one of five centers within the University of Michigan's Institute for Social Research. The Center receives core funding from both the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development {R24) and the National Institute on Aging (P30). PSC Research Reports are prepublication working papers that report on current demographic research conducted by PSC-affiliated researchers. These papers are written for timely dissemination and are often later submitted for publication in scholarly journals. The PSC Research Report Series was initiated in Copyrights for all Reports are held by the authors. Readers may quote from this work (except as limited by authors) if they properly acknowledge the authors and the PSC Series and do not alter the original work. Population Studies Center University of Michigan Institute for Social Research PO Box 1248, Ann Arbor, Ml USA