Gender imbalance and temporary migration: Evidence from rural China

This paper examines how sex ratio imbalance (more males than females) affects individual temporary migration decisions and broad migration trends at the county level in China. Due to the country’s one-child policy, strong son preference, and prenatal sex selection, rural areas have a surplus of unmarried males, leading to intensified competition for marriage partners. To enhance their attractiveness for marriage, unmarried males and households with unmarried sons have incentives to migrate to urban areas and accumulate wealth. Using data from a nationally representative Chinese household income survey and population census, we find that a one standard deviation increase in the local sex ratio raises rural unmarried males’ likelihood of temporary migration by 3.6 percentage points. Additionally, county-level evidence suggests that the increase in the local sex ratio can account for about 25% of the increase in temporary rural–urban migration during 2000–2010.