there is no incentive for the transferring hukou.26 However, temporary jobs are what local governments benefit from. Hence, the reform has not addressed rural migrant’s concerns due to contradictions between concerns of migrants and motivations for reform.
Concerns have been ignored also because there is a lack of political will despite voices that call for reform. The Deputy Minister of Public Security has stated that a draft for national reform is circulating within State Council.27 Wen Jiabao has also called for a faster reform.28 Rhetoric aside, there is a strong political stake that hinders the will for drastic change. For example, the Chinese Academy of Social Science estimated that with reform, the cost of welfare programmes will be around 45 trillion Yuan.29 Wen has suggested that by turning the rural migrants into active consumers, the programmes can be funded.30 But making rural migrants consumers require that they be paid more, which means inefficiencies in their work locations must be reduced to increase profit. Naturally, SOEs which are economically inefficient must be reformed. Indeed in 2010, only five percent of 1.1 trillion Yuan of profits was distributed to the central government.31 If SOEs are reformed, the central government can support local government’s economic capacity for financing hukou reforms. However, because SOEs are fundamental in ensuring the legitimacy of the Communist Party, it is likely to remain untouched for it affects the grey income and political status of many officials. Hence, hukou reform requires a political will that is willing to go beyond safe reforms, since hukou reform cannot be considered in isolation.
88826. Y., Zhu. “China's floating population and their settlement intention in the cities: Beyond the hukou reform.” Habitat International, 31(1), 2007.
88827. R., Li, R. “Hukou reform plan enters final stage new system of residence permits will be submitted to the state council for approval within a year.” South China Morning Post, 2012.
88828. A. Mccabe. “China's wen jiabao lays out his government's program.” Star – Phoenix, 2010.
88829. Reporter. “Hu’s calls on household registration reform face opposition.” South China Morn-ing Post, 2012.
88830. J. Ruwitch & H. Li. “China eyes residence permits to replace divisive hukou system.” Reut-ers, 2013.
88831. T., Miller. China's Urban Billion: The story behind the biggest migration in human history. Zed Books. Kindle Edition, 2012.
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