Urbanization and vulnerable employment: Empirical evidence from 163 countries in 1991-2019.

Many urban residents have recently lost their jobs due to the COVID-19 pandemic, which has made employment vulnerability in cities attained attention. It is thus important to explore the relationship between urbanization and employment. This study quantitatively analyzes spatiotemporal evolution and data correlation of urbanization and vulnerable employment, and explores the role urbanization plays in vulnerable employment by using historical data on 163 countries in the period 1991-2019 to test the theoretical hypothesis. The results show: It's clearly observed that there is a high correlation between the rate of urbanization and that of vulnerable employment, and the examples of G7 and BRICs are for it. The estimated urbanization yields a negative and statistically significant regression coefficient (-0.168), indicating that urbanization has a negative effect on vulnerable employment. If the urbanization rate increased by 1 %, the rate of vulnerable employment decreased by 0.168 %. The rural-urban sector conversion and changes in employment relationship driven by urbanization account for this. Countries with different income groups or populations have reacted differently to the rise in urbanization. Vulnerable employment in higher-income countries has been more significantly affected by the rise in urbanization, and more populous countries are more sensitive to it as well. These findings provide evidence for how urbanization promotes employment and decent work.

Identifying the spatial heterogeneity of housing financialization in China: Insights from a multiscale geographically weighted regression.

With the deepening linkage between housing and finance, the financial attributes of housing have been increasing. Thus, housing financialization has become a worldwide phenomenon that is gradually emerging in China's real estate market and thus cannot be ignored. The amount of urban capital is an important manifestation of financialization, but only a few studies have considered the spatial heterogeneity of impact of urban capital amount-represented by loan balances (LOAN) on housing prices. To fill this gap, this study builds a dataset of housing prices and influencing factors for county-level units using 2109 counties in China and analyzes the spatial scope and heterogeneity of housing financialization. Results show that globally, LOAN has a significant positive effect on housing prices, and the impact direction is in line with theoretical expectations. Locally, spatial heterogeneity exists for the impact of LOAN on housing prices, and the phenomenon of housing financialization is mainly observed in China's eastern coastal area. This study can help enhance the understanding of the spatial constraints on the impact of LOAN on housing prices and the spatial heterogeneity of housing financialization in China. Moreover, it provides a theoretical basis for policymakers to formulate spatially differentiated housing policies.

Distinctive transnational city-to-city partnerships, decentralization, and local governance of China as a Global East Country.

Against the background of globalisation and state rescaling, promoting decentralisation and enhancing local governance capacity have become prioritised objectives of transnational city-to-city partnerships mainly between developed and developing countries. However, considering the critical debates on Global East's uniqueness, two questions emerge when studying the transnational partnerships of Chinese cities. (1) Are Chinese cities' partnership establishments and objectives remarkably different from the existing international body of knowledge? (2) In China, whether decentralisation and local governance are promoted by city-to-city transnational partnerships as well? To cope with the questions, this paper examines 28 Chinese world cities' partnership establishments and objectives and reaches two conclusions. (1) With the objective of economic development, Chinese cities have consistently maintained strong connections with cities in both the developed and developing countries. (2) Chinese cities' transnational partnerships do not observably promote decentralisation, and China's political decentralisation is much more unstable than its economic decentralisation. Overall, both the binary partnership establishments and the dual-track decentralisation in political and economic aspects are highly embedded in China's interstitial and transitional position as a Global East country.

A Bibliometric Analysis on Research Regarding Residential Segregation and Health Based on CiteSpace.

Considerable scholarly attention has been directed to the adverse health effects caused by residential segregation. We aimed to visualize the state-of-the-art residential segregation and health research to provide a reference for follow-up studies. Employing the CiteSpace software, we uncovered popular themes, research hotspots, and frontiers based on an analysis of 1211 English-language publications, including articles and reviews retrieved from the Web of Science Core Collection database from 1998 to 2022. The results revealed: (1) The Social Science & Medicine journal has published the most studies. Roland J. Thorpe, Thomas A. LaVeist, Darrell J. Gaskin, David R. Williams, and others are the leading scholars in residential segregation and health research. The University of Michigan, Columbia University, Harvard University, the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health, and the University of North Carolina play the most important role in current research. The U.S. is the main publishing country with significant academic influence. (2) Structural racism, COVID-19, mortality, multilevel modelling, and environmental justice are the top five topic clusters. (3) The research frontier of residential segregation and health has significantly shifted from focusing on community, poverty, infant mortality, and social class to residential environmental exposure, structural racism, and health care. We recommend strengthening comparative research on the health-related effects of residential segregation on minority groups in different socio-economic and cultural contexts.

Differences in Subjective Well-Being between Formal and Informal Workers in Urban China.

This paper examines the relationship between different types of employment and subjective well-being with a focus on informal employment. The China Labor-force Dynamics Survey (CLDS) for three selected years (2012, 2014 and 2016) shows an upward trend in the subjective well-being of urban workers in the 2010s. However, although the gap in subjective well-being between formal and informal workers narrowed, informal workers' subjective well-being was still lower than their formal counterparts. Factors affecting the subjective well-being of formal and informal workers and their different effects were revealed to explain this difference. The subjective well-being of informal workers is significantly related to their informal status of employment, economic conditions (such as income and working hours), human capital, social capital (such as perceived social justice and perceived community connectedness) and urban environment. The paper enhances the understanding of people's subjective well-being by differentiating informal/formal segments of working populations.

Beyond the Intention: Individual-Level Determinants and Intergenerational Differences of Floating Populations' Actual Settlement Choices in Dongguan, China.

The migration process and patterns of floating populations have received continuing attention from scholars and policymakers. In China, however, studies have been focused on the settlement intention of floating populations based on sampling surveys and yielded inconsistent findings. Drawing upon 18,178,167 authentic individual samples of floating populations in Dongguan city, this study contributes to the literature by examining the effect of individual characteristics on the actual resident actions of floating populations, and revealing both the heterogeneity and continuity of their urban residence among four generations (i.e., during the 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s). The results show that the proportion of actual resident actions is lower than that reported by previous studies on settlement intentions, and that male, married, middle-aged, more educated, and long-residing members are more likely to choose to stay in Dongguan. Compared to their predecessors, the 1990 cohort reveals significant heterogeneities in their actual settlement choices. The study draws broad implications from the analysis, calling for the equalization of public welfare in Chinese cities and the encouragement of floating populations to sustain long-term residence in the destination cities.

The Changing Factors Affecting Local Environmental Governance in China: Evidence from a Study of Prefecture-Level Cities in Guangdong Province.

This paper aims to examine the changing factors underlying China's environmental governance, by investigating the long-term dynamic impacts of related endogenous and exogenous factors and considering regional differences in these factors. The study estimated environmental regulation intensity and employed the geographical detector technique to analyze its driving factors, based on 21 prefecture-level cities in Guangdong Province, China, from 1990 to 2016. The results showed that environmental regulation intensity has increased in Guangdong Province over the past 27 years. The results also indicated that local environmental governance was affected by global-local interactions and changed based on different regional developmental phases. At first, factors within a region affected local environmental policies more significantly, such as economic development and urbanization. However, in the long run, globalization's impacts have been the most important factors influencing environmental governance. Further analysis showed that environmental regulation intensity in Guangdong Province's different regions was affected by different driven factors. Our analyses contribute to the understanding of China's environmental governance and have policy implications for environmental problem management and China's construction of an ecological civilization.

Features and drivers for energy-related carbon emissions in mega city: The case of Guangzhou, China based on an extended LMDI model.

Based on the apparent energy consumption data, a systematic and comprehensive city-level total carbon accounting approach was established and applied in Guangzhou, China. A newly extended LMDI method based on the Kaya identity was adopted to examine the main drivers for the carbon emissions increments both at the industrial sector and the residential sector. Research results are listed as follow: (1) Carbon emissions embodied in the imported electricity played a significant important role in emissions mitigation in Guangzhou. (2) The influences and impacts of various driving factors on industrial and residential carbon emissions are different in the three different development periods, namely, the 10th five-year plan period (2003-2005), the 11th five-year plan period (2005-2010), and the 12th five-year plan period (2010-2013). The main reasons underlying these influencing mechanisms were different policy measures announced by the central and local government during the different five-year plan periods. (3) The affluence effect (g-effect) was the dominant positive effect in driving emissions increase, while the energy intensity effect of production (e-effect-Production), the economic structure effect (s-effect) and the carbon intensity effect of production (f-effect-Production) were the main contributing factors suppressing emissions growth at the industrial sector. (4) The affluence effect of urban (g-effect-AUI) was the most dominant positive driving factor on emissions increment, while the energy intensity effect of urban (e-effect-Urban) played the most important role in curbing emissions growth at the residential sector.

Spatial Characteristics and Driving Factors of Provincial Wastewater Discharge in China.

Based on the increasing pressure on the water environment, this study aims to clarify the overall status of wastewater discharge in China, including the spatio-temporal distribution characteristics of wastewater discharge and its driving factors, so as to provide reference for developing "emission reduction" strategies in China and discuss regional sustainable development and resources environment policies. We utilized the Exploratory Spatial Data Analysis (ESDA) method to analyze the characteristics of the spatio-temporal distribution of the total wastewater discharge among 31 provinces in China from 2002 to 2013. Then, we discussed about the driving factors, affected the wastewater discharge through the Logarithmic Mean Divisia Index (LMDI) method and classified those driving factors. Results indicate that: (1) the total wastewater discharge steadily increased, based on the social economic development, with an average growth rate of 5.3% per year; the domestic wastewater discharge is the main source of total wastewater discharge, and the amount of domestic wastewater discharge is larger than the industrial wastewater discharge. There are many spatial differences of wastewater discharge among provinces via the ESDA method. For example, provinces with high wastewater discharge are mainly the developed coastal provinces such as Jiangsu Province and Guangdong Province. Provinces and their surrounding areas with low wastewater discharge are mainly the undeveloped ones in Northwest China; (2) The dominant factors affecting wastewater discharge are the economy and technological advance; The secondary one is the efficiency of resource utilization, which brings about the unstable effect; population plays a less important role in wastewater discharge. The dominant driving factors affecting wastewater discharge among 31 provinces are divided into three types, including two-factor dominant type, three-factor leading type and four-factor antagonistic type. In addition, the proposals aimed at reducing the wastewater discharge are provided on the basis of these three types.