Inequality of opportunity in China: Evidence from pseudo panel data
利用中国综合社会调查构建伪面板数据，研究发现个人境遇（如性别、父亲特征）对收入优势影响显著，机会不平等在西部省份和年长群体中更突出。
We construct a pseudo panel sample from the China General Social Survey to study the inequality of opportunity in China. The pseudo panel enables us to control for cohort-specific heterogeneities when estimating the Mincer equation, and the results show that individual circumstances play a prominent role in determining income advantage. Counterfactual analysis further reveals the importance of cohort-level circumstances: individual circumstances account for less than 10% of the observed income inequality, whereas equalizing both the individual circumstances and the cohort fixed effects reduces income inequality by 30%. Among the individual circumstances we examine, gender and paternal characteristics contribute more to income inequality than does hukou of birth. Subsample analysis shows that China's western provinces exhibit the highest inequality of opportunity and that the inequality of opportunity among younger cohorts is smaller than that among older cohorts.