Abstract
Homeownership is a key element to maintain social welfare and stability in an aging society. Yet, the existing literature on homeownership does not adequately address non-Western cultures and institutional factors. We used two nationwide surveys in 2006 and 2010 to investigate how institutional factors are associated with homeownership among older adults in China. Institutional factors were measured by proxy measures of job seniority, political status, type of work units, and hierarchy of cities. After controlling for demographics, resources, health needs, neighborhood characteristics, and cultural factors, we found that homeownership was strongly associated with these institutional factors among the current cohorts of older adults in China. Older adults who were more senior or who were from public sectors tended to have a higher odds of homeownership. Older adults in the top or bottom of the city hierarchy tended to have a lower odds of homeownership than those in other types of cities. Implications of these findings are discussed.
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Notes
The hukou system was established in the 1950s to officially record and identify a person’s legal residence status in a certain area. The major purpose of the hukou system is to control the migration of people between urban and rural areas. Rural-urban migrants normally are not permitted to purchase any housing in urban areas without an urban hukou status even if they have lived there for many years, although such policies are relaxing in some cities (Tang et al. 2016).
Chinese cities are categorized by an administrative system that ranks cities from province-level cities (such as Beijing and Shanghai) down to quasi-province-level cities, province capital cities, prefecture-level cities, and county-level cities. In this hierarchy, province-level cities are at the top and county-level cities are at the bottom. Cities at different levels in the hierarchy have different levels of political or administrative powers, with greater power and larger budgets from the central government for higher ranked cities. County-level cities are subordinated under a prefecture-level city, but cities at other levels normally do not have such a subordinate administrative relation.
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Acknowledgments
The authors wish to thank the China National Research Center on Aging for authorizing access to the datasets and the editor and two anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments.
Authors’ Contribution
DG designed the research, drafted, revised, and supervised the data analyses. YY and JZ obtained the authorization to access to the datasets by the China National Research Center on Aging. Both performed the analyses. JS revised and interpreted the results. LQ assisted in drafting the paper.
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The paper was initiated when the corresponding author was working at Portland State University. Now he works at the United Nations. The views expressed in the paper are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of the United Nations, Central University of Finance and Economics, Chinese People’s Public Security University, University of the Sciences, and Portland State University.
Appendix A. Covariates and their Classifications
Appendix A. Covariates and their Classifications
Based on the FANRAIC-H conceptual framework and our focus on institutional factors (I), we controlled for five sets of covariates known to be associated with homeownership: fixed attributes (FA), or individual/family demographics; health and family needs (N); resources (R); neighborhood assets (A); and cultural factors (C).
The fixed attributes (FA) were measured by age (65–69, 70–74, 75–79, and 80+ compared to reference category 60–64), sex, ethnicity (Han vs. non-Han minorities), marital status (married vs. not-married [single/widowed/divorced]), and number of living children. Resource factors were measured by educational attainment in terms of years of schooling (<7, 7–9, 10–12, and 12 or more), and whether the respondent feels that he/she has adequate financial security in daily life (no vs. yes).
The need (N) factors were measured by disability in instrumental activities of daily living (IADL) and family size. IADL disability refers to physical functioning and was measured by degree of difficulty performing eleven items: cleaning the floor, grocery shopping, cooking, doing laundry, lifting a weight over 10 kg, managing money, walking for 2 km, indoor mobility, walking up or down stairs, making phone calls, and using public transportation. The total IADL score ranged from 0 to 22 after summing responses for each item (0 = can do alone, 1 = need help, 2 = cannot do). The reliability coefficient for IADL disability items was 0.91. Family size was measured by number of family members living and eating together in the same house/apartment.
Neighborhood assets (A) were measured by several proxy variables assessing local neighborhood housing amenities and types of neighborhoods. Neighborhood amenities included three sets of indicators. Condition of neighborhood facilities was measured by the summation of five dummy variables reflecting whether there were shops/malls, parks, clinics/hospitals, supermarkets/grocery stores, and banks in the local neighborhood. The reliability coefficient was 0.70. Availability of elderly facilities was measured by the summation of five dummy variables reflecting whether the local neighborhood had elders’ entertainment room, schools for elders, entertainment center for retired senior government officers, elderly care center, and public space/facility for exercise. The reliability coefficient was 0.85. Availability of service programs in the local community included ten dummy variables: in-home housewife program, in-home nursing, in-home doctor visit, chatting, hotline phone services for elders, meal making/delivery, accompanying elderly patients for hospital appointments, grocery/shopping assistance, rehabilitation, and legal consultation. The reliability coefficient was 0.89. The type of living quarters in the neighborhood that reflect socialized or privatized housing characteristics was measured as: commercialized housing zones (reference category), employer’s housing zones, old districts/alleys, and other types of living quarters.
Cultural tradition (C) was measured by proxies in terms of two variables relevant to children’s filial piety. The first is whether the older respondents received money from their children in the past year (yes vs. no). The second is the respondents’ response to a five-category question “What do you rate your children’s filial piety?” We combined very poor/poor/so so into a single category because of their small representation, producing three categories: (1) very poor/poor/so so (reference category), (2) good, and (3) very good.
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Gu, D., Yin, Y., Zhou, J. et al. Homeownership among Older Adults in Urban China: the Importance of Institutional Factors. J Cross Cult Gerontol 31, 337–355 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10823-016-9305-1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10823-016-9305-1