Interregional Inequality, (Un)Fairness Perception and Attribution in China

• In Event: Social Policy, Redistribution, and Inequality in China

Abstract

China became one of the world's most unequal societies during the 2000s. Its Gini coefficient—a measure of income inequality scaled between 0 and 1—increased from roughly .30 in 1980 to almost .55 in 2012. Existing studies indicate that regional economic disparities are one of the most important factors explaining China's high income inequality. Nonetheless, less is known about whether and to what extent regional economic disparities affect individuals' perceptions and attribution of (un)fairness. Presumably, citizens living in regions with highly uneven development will perceive more unfairness and attribute it less to individuals as opposed to the government. We test these theoretical predictions using individual-level longitudinal data and innovative measures of interregional economic inequality in China. We find evidence in support of the theoretical predictions in both 2002 and 2019 data. Moreover, we find that regional economic inequalities enlarged the effect of social class on fairness perceptions. In more unequal regions, lower classes perceived more unfairness than higher classes did, suggesting that the class cleavage is more salient in the regions with highly uneven development. These findings call attention to the structural causes of individuals' perceptions and attribution of unfairness. Specifically, this study has two implications. First, Chinese perceptions of unfairness align with the economic inequalities within their resident provinces. Second, in a province with relatively even development among cities, the citizens are less likely to blame the government for distributive unfairness.

Authors

• Dong Wook Lee, Adelphi University

• Xian Huang, Rutgers University