Abstract
Using census data, this paper has the following findings: although the scale of ’unmarried elders’ is large in our country, the percentage in age cohort is very low; there are more males than females within the group with more disparity in rural areas; the majority of ’unmarried elders’ in rural areas are older than those in urban areas; regarding marriage selection of ’unmarried elders’, ’elder females’ are difficult to find their spouses in urban areas, while there are more left ’elder males’ in rural areas. Regarding the essence of ’unmarried elders’ issue, it is not due to imbalance in ratio of age and sex in general population, but rather caused by structural imbalance in individual characteristics, which means outstanding females and disadvantaged males are more likely to become ’unmarried elders’. In recent years, with increase in scale of ’unmarried elders’ and rise of its percentage in age cohort, gender imbalance in quantity has slowed down. For most ’unmarried elders’, this is just an temporary living condition in their whole life course, most of them will enter marriage eventually. The males who never marry all their life are less than 4%,the females are less than 1%.
Translated title of the contribution | Who has been left?: Rethinking China’s ‘unmarried elders’ problem |
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Original language | Chinese (Simplified) |
Pages (from-to) | 76-84 |
Number of pages | 9 |
Journal | Youth Study |
Volume | 2015 |
Issue number | 4 |
Publication status | Published - 2015 |
Externally published | Yes |