Prof. CHENG Mingwang, Deputy Dean of Tongji SEM and Professor of the Department of Public Administration, as the corresponding author, and WEI Xinyu, a doctoral student, published a paper entitled “Contract Binding, Labour Protection System and Migrant Workers’ Well-Being: A Case Study of Shanghai Municipality” in the China’s leading journal “Management World”.

Journal: Management World

All authors: Cheng Mingwang (School of Economics and Management, Tongji University), Wei Xinyu (School of Economics and Management, Tongji University)

Keywords: legally binding contracts, labour protection system, migrant workers’ well-being

Introduction to the main content of the paper

Promoting the comprehensive development of rural migrant workers in building and sharing is the inevitable requirement of the Party Central Committee to “promote fairness and justice and improve people’s well-being”. Based on 4858 micro samples in Shanghai from 2015 to 2020, we empirically analyze the effects of labour contract binding and labour protection on the well-being of rural migrant workers and their mechanisms, using health as a proxy variable for well-being. The study finds that: (1) 84.64% of migrant workers have signed some form of contract with their employers, indicating that the promulgation and implementation of the Labour Contract Law has promoted the legalization of labour relations in the migrant labour market and the standardization of contract signing. 24.68% of migrant workers have been provided with five insurance policies and one pension by their employing enterprises, and 36.25% of migrant workers’ employing enterprises have purchased “five insurances and one pension”. 36.25% of migrant workers are employed by enterprises that strictly adhere to the working time system, and 56.98% of migrant workers are provided with food and beverage subsidies by their employing enterprises, indicating that the implementation of China’s labour protection system needs to be improved. (2) The more legally binding the labour contracts signed by migrant workers, the greater the incentives for their enterprises to enforce the labour protection system. The labour protection system plays an important intermediary role in the process of contract binding to promote the welfare of migrant workers. All three aspects of labour protection systems, namely social insurance, working time system and living welfare, significantly increase the level of well-being of migrant workers. (3) Further heterogeneity analyses revealed that the above phenomena were more significant in the sample of migrant workers with lower levels of education, employed in the service sector, and from regions with lower levels of institutional quality. This study is of great significance for promoting the well-being of migrant workers and even for achieving the goal of social justice in China.

Research Experience Sharing

The team has long focused on the “three rural issues”, particularly migrant workers. Since China’s Reform and Opening up, hundreds of millions of migrant workers have flocked to cities, contributing to China’s ‘growth miracle’. In our fieldwork and interviews, we found that migrant workers are still disadvantaged in the urban labour market. Some migrant workers do not sign employment contracts, and some employers do not implement labour protection systems. Protecting the rights and interests of migrant workers and improving their welfare are still serious problems. Based on this problem orientation, we established the theme of legally binding labour contracts and labour protection systems to improve the well-being of migrant workers. The cycle from writing to publication is almost 4 years. Repeated revisions and refinements have allowed us to experience the bitterness and joy of academic research. We are very grateful to the reviewers for their constructive comments on this article, who provided many very professional and detailed suggestions on the research background, theoretical hypotheses, robustness analysis and restructuring of the article, which significantly improved the quality of the article. We would also like to thank the editorial staff of Management World for their hard work, which is very professional, rigorous and responsible, and for carefully correcting all the details of this article. We would like to express our sincere thanks to the reviewers and editors!

Professor Profile

CHENG Minwang

Vice Dean of Tongji SEM; “Changjiang Scholar” Distinguished Professor of the Ministry of Education, “Young Changjiang Scholar”, “Oriental Scholar” (Shanghai Distinguished Professor), “Shuguang Scholar”, “Pujiang Talent”. Prof. CHENG has published more than 70 articles in top or important journals such as “Ecological Economics”, “Economic Research” and “Management World”. He has led over more than 10 major projects of the National Social Science Foundation of China, of the Ministry of Education for Philosophy and Social Science Research, of the National Social Science Foundation of China, and of the National Natural Science Foundation of China. He has won the first and second prizes of “Excellent Achievements in Scientific Research of Higher Education Institutions of the Ministry of Education”, the first, second and third prizes of “Excellent Achievements in Philosophy and Social Science of Shanghai”, and the “Zhang Peigang Award for Developmental Economics”. Economics Award”, etc.

Research areas: public policy and macroeconomic analysis, labour economics, development economics and human resource management.