Converging Divergences: Gendered Patterns of Career Mobility in Urban China’s Economic Transition Guangye He Department of Sociology School of Social and Behavior Sciences Nanjing University, China Center for Applied Social and Economic Research Hong Kong University of Science and Technology Hong Kong SAR, China Xiaogang Wu Center for Applied Social and Economic Research Hong Kong University of Science and Technology Hong Kong SAR, China University of Michigan Population Studies Center Research Report 16-875 December 2016 An earlier version of this paper was presented at the Annual Meeting of the Population Association of America, May 1-3rd, 2014, Boston, MA. Guangye He would like to thank the Hong Kong Research Grants Council (RGC) for a Hong Kong PhD Fellowship award, and a Post-doctoral Fellowship Matching Fund (PDF) from Office of Vice President for Research & Graduate Studies, HKUST; Xiaogang Wu would like to thank the RGC for financial support from the General Research Fund (GRF 646411 and 16600117). Direct correspondence to Guangye He ([email protected]) or Xiaogang Wu ([email protected]), Division of Social Science, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, Clear Water Bay, Kowloon, Hong Kong SAR, CHINA. Converging Divergences: Gendered Patterns of Career Mobility in Urban China’s Economic Transition 2 ABSTRACT This article examines gendered patterns of career mobility during urban China’s economic transition. As labor markets become increasingly competitive and women gradually lose the employment protection they used to enjoy under state socialism, work-family conflicts become more prominent in shaping women’s career trajectories and their labor market outcomes. Based on the analysis of the retrospective life history data from the Chinese General Social Survey conducted in 2008, we show that Chinese women in the workforce are more adversely affected by marriage and dependent children than their male counterparts; they are more likely to withdraw from the labor market to fulfill their roles as wives and mothers and are less likely to move up in the career ladder. This pattern is more salient in the late reform stage (1999-2008) than before. These findings bear important implications for formulating effective social policies to promote gender equality in contemporary China. Converging Divergences: Gendered Patterns of Career Mobility in Urban China’s Economic Transition 3 INTRODUCTION Women typically take a greater share of responsibility for household duties than men, and transitions to marriage and parenthood tend to enhance the traditional gender division of labor (i.e., Bianchi, Milkie, Sayer, & Robinson, 2000; Gupta, 1999). As married women spend more time and effort on housework and childcare, they have less time available for career development. Therefore, women are less likely to be re-employed after taking maternity leave and more likely to withdraw from the labor market, and such career interruptions also limit their promotion chances and earnings attainment (Becker, 1991). Numerous studies have demonstrated a substantial penalty for women associated with getting married and giving birth (e.g., Budig & England, 2001; Cheng, 2015; Glauber, 2007; Hochschild, 1989; Looze, 2014; Miller, 2011; Yu & Xie, 2014). Most of these studies, however, are based on the evidence from Western societies. As gender disparities are largely contingent upon the historical and institutional circumstance of different countries, it is unclear whether gender inequality in non-Western societies follows the same pattern as that in the West (Cotter, Hermsen, & Vanneman, 1999). Although women’s reproductive role (e.g., marriage and childbirth) may be universal, its hindering effects on their productive work in labor markets could vary across societies with different gender ideology, which is rooted deeply in historical and cultural traditions and social welfare systems. The work- family tension for married women may thus be more prominent in a society with a stronger patriarchal culture. Various social policies adopted by the welfare state could ease such tension and thus are conducive to gender egalitarianism in the society (e.g., Orloff, 1993). Notwithstanding the entrenchment of gender roles in families, the impact of marriage and childbirth on women’s career mobility may also change amid rapid socioeconomic transformation and fundamental shifts in welfare regimes. As far as we know, few empirical studies on women’s career mobility and its link to their reproductive roles have been situated in such a broad context of social change. The massive socioeconomic changes in China over the past four decades provide a unique chance for scholars to examine how the institutional transition from a centrally planned economy to a market economy can re-shape gender stratification, and in particular, affect women’s career mobility as they get married and have children. Converging Divergences: Gendered Patterns of Career Mobility in Urban China’s Economic Transition 4 Based on the retrospective life history data from the Chinese General Social Survey (CGSS) conducted in 2008, we empirically investigate the role of marriage and parenthood in affecting job mobility and how the effects differ between men and women amid dramatic institutional transformation in urban China. Employing event history analyses, we demonstrate the divergent patterns of career mobility between men and women and how they are associated with important life events such as marriage and childbirth, leading to cumulative advantages/disadvantages in socioeconomic outcomes over the life course. THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK Work, Family and Women’s Socioeconomic Disadvantages Gender inequalities in education, employment and earnings in Western societies have been well documented in the sociological and economic literature. In general, scholars have found that gender inequality has declined over time, and the temporal change is closely associated with other secular trends such as economic development and educational expansion (Reskin 1993). Economic development may boost the demand for a highly educated labor force and facilitate educational expansion. Comparative studies of educational stratification show that educational expansion tends to favor women (Hout & Diprete, 2006; Shavit & Blossfeld, 1993). Notwithstanding these changes, the gender earnings gap persists in most developed countries. Economists and sociologists have attempted to explain the sources of gender earnings disparities. An earlier argument was that women were socioeconomically disadvantaged relative to men because they lacked human capital, such as education, skills, and work experience (Becker, 1991). After taking into account these individual characteristics pertaining to productivity, the unexplained part of the earnings gap was simply assumed to be resulted from the discrimination against women. Another argument highlights the important role of occupational gender segregation in explaining earnings disparities between men and women (Jacobs, 1989; Marani, 1989; Treiman & Hartmann, 1981). Scholars have shown that gender earnings disparities in Western societies are largely associated with differential distribution of occupations between men and women (Peterson & Morgan, 1995; Treiman & Hartmann, 1981). Converging Divergences: Gendered Patterns of Career Mobility in Urban China’s Economic Transition 5 Given the fact that women have reached parity with or even exceeded men in educational attainment in the developed world, the human capital theory has been largely discredited as an explanation for either unequal pay for equal work or unequal access to rewarding jobs (Reskin, 1993). It is the persistence of occupational gender segregation that requires further explanations. Many scholars have pointed to the gender differences in family roles and their interactions with individual careers (O’Neill, 2003). Indeed, the early stage of career trajectories for men and women evolve independently to a large extent. For those who have just completed their formal education and started their first jobs, there are little gender differences in career aspirations and occupational attainments. Empirical evidence also shows a fairly small gender wage gap at the time of labor market entry (e.g., Loprest, 1992; Manning & Swaffield, 2008). It is upon marriage, especially after childbirth, that women’s career trajectories diverge from men’s, presumably interrupting their careers (Jacobs and Gerson 2004). Therefore, over their life course, women have less incentive than men to invest on human capital, and they indeed accumulate less on average. They are more likely to leave the workforce or to leave sooner than men upon marriage and having children (Jacobs and Gerson 2004). Among those who work, women are more likely to choose jobs that are more flexible to accommodate their family responsibilities (Polacheck & Siebert, 1993; O’Neill, 2003). Such a life course perspective in social stratification provides a compelling account of how life events are intertwined to differentially shape patterns of career mobility for men and women (Jacobs and Gerson 2004). Over the life course, an individual experiences a series of role transitions. Transitions to marriage and parenthood tend to deepen the traditional division of labor between men and women (Bianchi et al., 2000; Gupta, 1999; Sanchez & Thomson, 1997). As household work falls disproportionately on the shoulders of women, and subsequent childcare further intensifies such disparities, tension