Zhu Haiyan, Xie Yu
Department of Sociology, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, USA.
Department of Sociology, Princeton University, USA and Center for Social Research, Peking University, China.
Chin J Sociol. 2017 Jan;3(1):56-73. doi: 10.1177/2057150X16685499. Epub 2017 Jan 1.
For Chinese families, coresidence with elderly parents is both a form of support and a moderator of financial support. Previous literature on intergenerational support in Chinese societies has studied either coresidence or financial support independently, but not these two forms of support jointly. Using data from the 1999 "Study of Family Life in Urban China" in Shanghai, Wuhan, and Xi'an, we examined whether or not adult children, especially sons, buy out of the obligation to live with their parents by providing greater financial support. To account for the potential selection bias associated with coresidence, we treated coresidence and financial transfer as joint outcomes by using endogenous switching regression models. The results showed that children who coreside with their parents would have provided more financial support had they lived away, and children who live away from their parents would have provided more financial support had they coresided. These findings suggest a self-selection mechanism that maximizes children's interests rather than parents'.
对于中国家庭而言，与年迈父母同住既是一种赡养形式，也是经济支持的调节因素。以往关于中国社会代际支持的文献，要么单独研究同住情况，要么单独研究经济支持，而没有将这两种支持形式结合起来研究。利用1999年在上海、武汉和西安开展的“中国城市家庭生活研究”的数据，我们研究了成年子女，尤其是儿子，是否通过提供更多经济支持来免除与父母同住的义务。为了应对与同住相关的潜在选择偏差，我们使用内生转换回归模型，将同住和经济转移视为联合结果。结果表明，与父母同住的子女如果不住在一起会提供更多经济支持，而与父母不住在一起的子女如果住在一起也会提供更多经济支持。这些发现表明存在一种自我选择机制，这种机制使子女的利益而非父母的利益最大化。
