Quality of life declines in big and growing cities. Poverty in cities

The quality of life in developing countries during the first couple of decades after the Second World War was higher in cities than in small towns and villages. However, the relative advantage of city dwellers in developing countries has declined since the 1970s, with high-growth rate cities experiencing a more severe decline. Infant mortality levels in Latin America and sub-Saharan Africa in the 1990s are as high in large cities as in the smallest towns and villages. In most developing regions, big city residents are increasingly disadvantaged, such that researchers and policymakers can no longer assume that the quality of life in urban areas is better than in rural areas. The urban transformation of the developing world is similar to the 19th century urbanization of now-developed countries, but today many more people are crowding into far bigger cities. Using survey information from 43 countries representing 63% of the developing world's urban population outside of China and India, Martin Brockerhoff of the Population Council and Ellen Brennan of the UN Population Division found that rapid population growth and big size have overwhelmed the capacity of cities to provide essential goods and services.     

空间相互作用与城市经济增长--来自长三角的证据

基于以往研究对空间相互作用方向性考虑不足的事实,文章以长三角133个县市为例,构建了融合新经济地理学与中心地理论的理论框架,将表征空间需求关联的总体市场潜能细分为来自同层级、高等级、低等级三个方向,利用空间计量模型估计了总体及不同方向的空间相互作用对长三角地区人均GDP增长与人口增长的效应。结果显示：在控制空间依赖导致的间接溢出效应等因素后,并未发现存在要素价格绝对调整或要素数量绝对调整的证据,总体市场潜能的提高同时促进了城市人均GDP增长与人口增长;就不同方向的空间相互作用而言,大城市的自身发展有利于中等城市的人均GDP增长,大城市之间、大城市对下级城市、小城市对上级城市形成了人口增长的良性互动格局,而中等城市之间以及中等城市对大城市的人口增长则表现为回流效应。     

地方品质与经济机会对劳动力流动的影响 ——基于CLDS 2016的实证分析

基于2016年中国劳动力动态调查数据,采用条件logit模型实证考察了决定中国城际劳动力区位选择的区域和个人因素。旨在评估流动劳动力选择目的地时地方品质、就业机会和经济结构的相对权重,以及这些地方因素在不同类型的劳动力中的作用程度。结果表明:(1)地方品质对吸引迁移人口流入有显著的正向促进作用且大于就业机会带来的效应,迁移人口会倾向于流向地方品质更好的城市。(2)通过对比地方品质和工资水平对流动人口流向选择概率的影响可以计算得到流动人口对于地方品质水平提升1个单位的支付意愿约为9.70元。(3)从异质性检验结果来看,个人消费服务、地区基础结构和公共服务对本地吸引人才流入的能力均表现出显著的带动性;年轻一代和室内工作的劳动力群体更加注重环境因素的考量,对城市品质提出了更高的要求。相比于地方品质,高教育水平劳动者受到高工资水平的调节作用更大。来自城镇的劳动者更加重视地方品质建设对自身带来的影响,而来自农村的劳动者更加注重工资报酬所带来的经济效用;流入内陆、淮北地区、特大、超大和高收入阶段的城市吸引劳动力受城市地方品质的影响效果更显著;流入内陆、淮南地区、大中小和中等收入偏上/偏下城市吸引劳动力受工资水平的影响更显著。     

Internet Communication Versus Face-to-face Interaction in Quality of Life

This study seeks to understand the role of the Internet in quality of life (QoL). Specifically, it examines the question of whether Internet communication serves, like face-to-face interactions, to enhance quality of life. It is hypothesized that the use of the Internet for interpersonal communication can improve quality of life among Internet users, just like face-to-face communication in everyday life. Sample survey data were collected in four Chinese cities, namely Hong Kong, Taipei, Beijing, and Wuhan, to serve as replicates to test the hypothesis. The Satisfaction with Life Scale (SWLS) of Diener (1984) was used to measure quality of life in the four cities. It was found that contrary to our expectation, Internet communication cannot predict quality of life while face-to-face communication with friends and family members can. The result was the same across the four Chinese cities. Possible reasons for this finding are examined and discussed.     

Public Green Space Use and Consequences on Urban Vitality: An Assessment of European Cities

The promotion of quality of life is becoming ever more important in a scenario of regional, national and even international competition among cities, triggered by globalization. Public sites, and green spaces in particular, which are available in varying extent in all urban areas, can bring important benefits to urban vitality and, as a consequence, to quality of life. However, cities are intricate entities and measuring their success in converting the potential for public green space usage into increased quality of life is a difficult task. In order to contribute to the objective of assessing the potential for public green space use, and its consequences on urban vitality, we applied the Data Envelopment Analysis technique to assess a total of 174 European cities. The results detect the best performing cities, and for the cities considered inefficient, a set of benchmarks is identified, whose best practices can be copied to support efforts of performance improvement.     

A Perception Survey for the Evaluation of Urban Quality of Life in Kocaeli and a Comparison of the Life Satisfaction with the European Cities

Studies on urban quality of life (QoL) have been attracting lots of attention from various countries due to the deterioration of urban environment and decrease of the urban QoL. These studies that have been supported by international organizations such as United Nations, World Bank, OECD, European Commission and EUROSTAT (European Statistics) involve comparative assessment of life satisfaction in the European cities and comparing cities facilitate the exchange of experiment and improve the quality of local policies. The main objective of this study is to measure the local perceptions of QoL in Kocaeli, which is one of the important industrial cities of Turkey and compare the life satisfaction with the European cities. Generally, two different types of indicators have been used: objective and subjective indicators. The objective indicators cover five fields: socio-economic aspects, participation in civic life, education and training, environment and culture, and leisure. The subjective indicators are mainly for valuation of QoL perceptions in a city. In this research, a perception survey will be carried out to measure the local perceptions of QoL in Kocaeli. This survey will present on issues for which the residents in the Kocaeli had widely diverging opinions: employment opportunities, housing costs, safety, cleanliness of city, public transport, air quality and overall satisfaction with the QoL of their city. Thus, the study will become a major reference for local officials to improve QoL in Kocaeli and contribute to researches on QoL in cities.     

Homeownership and Subjective Wellbeing in Urban China: Does Owning a House Make You Happier?

This paper examines the effect of homeownership status on individual subjective wellbeing indicators in urban China using a large nationally representative dataset. It is the first to gauge the relationship between homeownership and individual subjective wellbeing in the setting of China and is also among the few empirical studies concerning developing countries. The results show that the homeownership status does have a strong positive effect on both one’s housing satisfaction and overall happiness in urban China. Even after controlling for housing satisfaction in the equation, the homeownership status still positively affects one’s overall happiness, suggesting that the homeownership status might also contribute to other possible aspects of life satisfaction except for housing satisfaction. In addition, in terms of housing satisfaction, females seem to value much more on owning a house than males, while the subjective benefits of owing a house in large cities seem to be much smaller than in small cities.     

Does ranking stimulate government performance? Evidence from China’s key environmental protection cities

With the air quality ranking of China’s Ministry of Ecology and Environment as a case, this paper examines whether the public ranking could stimulate the ranked cities to improve performance. The results show that the horizontal ranking, i.e., the relative position among the cities, significantly stimulates the cities to improve air quality. The stimulating effect is significant for all the three type of cities, i.e., cities with good, medium and poor air quality, and is the strongest for the cities with good air quality. However, the stimulating effect for air quality improvement is not enough to alter the air quality comparison among the cities. Compared to other cities, if a city is ranked relatively low in the last year, the air quality in the current year is still relatively poor. The inertia is particularly significant for the cities with poor air quality. The vertical ranking, i.e., if the rank of a city progresses or retrogresses, does not affect the air quality and air quality change of the city. Overall, public ranking is argued to stimulate performance improvement by seducing the competition among local governments, although the actual effect is still subject to the perception of local governments and their capacity to respond to the ranking.

     

Quality of life perceptions in two cultures

This paper reports and analyzes the quality of life perceptions held by the inhabitants of two culturally different but demographically similar cities: Springfield, Illinois and Aix-en-Provence, France. Although the Springfielders expressed greater satisfaction than the Aixois in virtually all the life domains covered by the research, the areas of relative satisfaction and dissatisfaction were remarkably similar in the two cities; furthermore, the domains in which the French indicated the least satisfaction were generally ones where their objective quality of life conditions were inferior to those of their American counterparts. Multiple regression techniques are used to trace the relative contribution of domain satisfactions and demographic characteristics in explaining respondents' comparative life enjoyment and reported levels of happiness.     

Loneliness and Life Satisfaction in Turkish Early Adolescents: The Mediating Role of Self Esteem and Social Support

This study aimed to measure whether self-esteem and social support are mediators in the relationship between loneliness and life satisfaction. The study includes early teenagers from the 6th, 7th and 8th grades aged between 11 and 15 (M = 13.31, SD = 1.09). The study group consisted of 431 secondary school students from large and medium sized cities in Turkey, of which 196 (44.5 %) were girls and 235 (54.5 %) were boys. The study examined students’ responses to life satisfaction, loneliness, self-esteem and social support scales. Data were separated into parcels of instruments within the framework of structural equation modeling. It was determined that both self-esteem and social support were partial mediators between loneliness and life satisfaction. These results are discussed within the scope of the literature.     

劳动力就业城市选择对城市工资溢价的影响

中国逐步从定居社会转变为流迁社会,劳动力大范围流动体现在就业城市的自主选择上,该行为对城市工资溢价产生持续影响,同时城市工资溢价又影响劳动力的就业城市选择。利用2017年中国流动人口动态监测调查数据,构建包含个体选择的处置效应模型,实证分析发现,中国存在城市工资溢价现象,劳动力的异质性特征和城市差异性特征显著影响就业城市选择行为;纠正劳动力城市选择的内生二元选择偏差后,发现中国特大城市和超大城市的工资溢价变大,而大城市的工资溢价消失,中小城市工资比大城市更有竞争力。中国城市体系中的首尾优势是劳动力理性选择就业城市的结果,这为中国实施差异化的城市发展政策来实现城市体系的整体优化和内部协调提供了新思路。     

广东城镇空巢老人的养老生活状况及问题分析

“空巢”正日益成为城镇老人主流的居家养老方式,广东城镇空巢老人的比例已超过一半。虽然广东城镇空巢老人对自己的生活满意度比较高,但空巢老人面临的问题和困难也不少。社会必须大力发展养老服务业,适应广大城镇空巢老人的多样化需求,化解空巢老人面临的困难和风险,以提高其养老生活质量。     

Review of Concepts,Tools and Indices for the Assessment of Urban Quality of Life

Social Indicators Research - The rapid urban growth poses a huge challenge in sustaining the quality of local environment and life characteristics in contemporary cities. There is a growing body of...     

城市老年人生活质量分析

本文运用2000年辽宁城市老年人口抽样调查数据,对各类型城市老年人生活质量的主要影响因素进行了分析,指出一部分老年人已构成城市贫困群体和弱势群体,离退休金是保障城市老年人生活质量的最重要因素,文化素质和身体素质是对城市老年人生活质量产生负向影响的主要因素。     

The Perceived Role of ICTs in Quality of Life in Three Chinese Cities

This study assesses the perceived role of information and communication technologies (ICTs) including the Internet, mobile telephone, CD/MD/MP3, television and VCR/VCD/DVD in raising quality of life (QoL). A comparison is made between three Chinese cities, namely, Beijing, Taipei and Hong Kong, to see if differences exist in the perceived value of various forms of ICTs in the three cities, which share Chinese culture but different levels of development. Household interviews with probability samples were conducted in the three cities in 2002–2003. The findings show that the Internet and mobile phone are considered as the most and second most important medium respectively in raising quality of life in all three cities, while television ranks third and other ICTs trail behind. Based on the findings, the authors advance four propositions for the perceived role of ICTs in QoL. First, there are four basic needs related to ICT’s role in QoL. These “ICT-QoL” needs are the need for interaction, need for being in touch, need for instantaneous communication, and need for entertainment. Second, people’s assessment of an ICT’s value in raising their QoL varies with the penetration rate of that ICT—the higher the penetration, the more positive is the assessment of that ICT’s role in QoL. Third, the perceived value of an ICT in QoL declines with time—the longer the ICT has been around after reaching full penetration rate, the lower the value is attached to its contribution to QoL. Finally, education has strong influences on the assessment of the Internet’s role in QoL. Highly educated people tend to value the Internet most as a QoL raiser irrespective of the city they reside in. As a QoL raiser, the Internet is favored more by highly educated while mobile and fixed phone are favored more by lowly educated people.     

The kindness of strangers revisited: a comparison of 24 US cities

Three field studies compared helping behavior across a sample of 24 small, medium and large cities across the United States. The relationship of helping to statistics reflecting the demographic, social, and economic characteristics of these communities was then examined. The strongest predictors of city differences in helping were population size, population density, economic purchasing power and, to a somewhat lesser extent, walking speed. Changes in several community variables over the past decade were also associated with helping: population size, economic well-being as measured by both purchasing power and poverty rates, and crime rates. These data were compared to similar data collected 13–15 years ago.     

The quality of urban life and the perception of livability: A case study of neighbourhoods in Benin City,Nigeria

Third World cities face many persistent planning problems. The problems persist partly because planning has not been sufficiently responsive to local peculiarities. This lack of responsiveness is in turn because of the gross scale at which problems are conceived and attacked. One of the persistent problems in all Nigerian cities is their poor environmental quality. This study, therefore, seeks to investigate the environmental problems of Benin City, capital of Bendel State of Nigeria. Six environmental dimensions are measured and analysed. A composite conceptual index of quality of life is derived from the six dimensions, and compared with an index of perceived quality for each area. The study adopts the neighbourhood as the unit in collecting and analysing data, and in proposing solutions. It is recommended that planning administration in Benin City must be decentralized, if it is to be more responsive to intra-city environmental eccentricities, and improve the quality of life.     

Objective and subjective social indicators of the quality of life in American SMSA'S: A reanalysis

The paper examines and critiques Schneider's work that related the subjective and objective indicators of quality of life in American cities. The work then employs data collected by Liu in 1973, and the Institute for Survey Research in 1972 as part of their national election study for 41 large and medium-sized Standard Metropolitan Statistical Areas (SMSA's) to re-examine the question of the relationship between the objective and subjective factors. Although the results of this paper are in general comparable with those obtained by Schneider, there are individual cases where they differ. The paper then concludes with a discussion of the reasons why objective and subjective indicators may coincide.     

The quality of natural environment and mortality (based on the example of major cities in Poland)

"The paper presents the results of [a] study on the relationship between environmental degeneration and mortality in major cities of Poland [during the 1980s].... The authors examine 22 major cities differed according to the degree of pollution.... The analysis employs...life tables and methods of multiple regression.... The influence of the natural environment quality on mortality is diversified according to sex and age but in general, the interdependence is not strong."     

An analysis of the size of the family household and family structure in China]

Since 1949, great social and economic changes have taken place in China. The entire economic structure and social relations are no longer the way they used to be. These changes have also had a strong impact on the size of family households and family structure. Major changes are summarized as follows: (1) The size of the present family household has been greatly reduced from its earlier size. The main reason for this reduction in size is the change of the social system. Under the new social system, the natural population growth rate and family structure have shown the greatest change from the past. (2) The major change in family structure is that small families have replaced the traditional large families. Under the large family system, several generations may stay together as one household, and brothers do not divide the large family even after they are married. Under the small family system, a household is normally limited to the parents and their children. With the gradual disappearance of large families, small families are increasing rapidly. Some households with three generations living together are still in existence, and the young and the old may support each other in their daily life. Both in cities and in rural areas, the traditional custom of respecting one's old parents still exists. There must be a value and necessity for the existence of this particular kind of family structure.