Title:Informal Institution meets Child Development: Clan Culture and Child Labor in China (with Can Tang)

Speaker: Zhong Zhao

Abstract:This paper makes the first attempt to explore the influences of an informal institution – clan culture, which was a hallmark culture in Chinese history – on the prevalence of child labor in China. We find that the clan culture can significantly reduce the incidence of child labor, and the impact is stringer for boys in rural areas or in households with lower socioeconomic status. Our findings highlight that though clan culture as an informal institution could partially substitute for formal institution in term of risk sharing, the negative consequence of gender-bias impact resulting from the patriarchal and patrilineal nature of clan culture cannot be ignored.

Zhong Zhao：Zhong Zhao is an associate dean and a professor of economics at the School of Labor and Human Resources, Renmin University of China, and a member of the university academic committee. He is an associate editor of the Journal of Population Economics. He holds a bachelor's degree in economics from the Renmin University of China and a doctorate degree in economics from the Johns Hopkins University.

Date: November 29, Thursday, 2018

Time: 13:30-14:45 PM

Location: Room 608, Academic Hall, CUFE