The Hukou System in China

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There is a wide range of young female factory workers in China. These employees work tremendously hard to receive their earnings. No more than to send it to family members or for savings, then they must go back to their home town. Young female workers get paid very little for all the effort and time spent, including over time and being mistreated. In China, there are floating workers and migrants that come to the city seeking a job. Floating workers refer to the young Chinese women, who move from the countryside into the city for jobs. When a worker is labeled, “floating”, it indicates that they are not there to stay for a long period of time. In other words, floating workers are supposed to go back home after they have saved up so much money. So therefore, when the money comes to an end, they come back to the city to work and save it up. Due to the over growing population to the city, the government created a system called hukou. The hukou system generates obstacles for these migrants and floating workers.
The hukou system is a residence permit. If a worker does not have a residence permit, they have no legal right to live there. Also, this permit does not allow these workers to move where ever they want. The Communist Party rule (1950s) began to use the hukou system to limit movement and enforce financial separation (Magistad, 2013, p.1). Since China wanted to build successful cities, they needed cheap migrant labor it factories to do the odd jobs that normal residences wouldn’t do. Due to the changes, the restriction on where one can live is less. For instance, as long as an individual has a job, they can live in the city, such as, Shanghai. On that note, Shanghai has a population of approximately 13 million, plus 10 or 11 m...

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...self-worth. For the most part, women are an importance to the factory jobs in the city of China. Floating workers refer to the young Chinese women, who move from the countryside into the city for jobs. An estimated, 80 percent of the factory workers are made up of women, around the ages of 18- 25 (Chang, 2001, p. 100). Although their wages are low and they get mistreated, these women still do their work and are able to support themselves and others. And on top of that they have to worry about the hukou residency permit due to the over growing population to the city. The hukou system produces difficulties with migrants and floating workers. But through it all, the floating workers and migrants bring diversity and cultural differences to the cities of China. The cities of China bring jobs for these workers, while these workers provided new knowledge and creativity.

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