Aiming to introduce market mechanisms to an administratively managed and heavily subsidized housing system, the ongoing housing reform in urban China has brought dramatic changes in housing provision and consumption. Chinese households have started to enjoy freedom of housing choice that was not possible in socialist China. Yet, their choices are constrained because of the transitional nature of the current housing system where both institutional forces and market mechanisms operate. It is the goal of this research to examine how these two types of forces interact and how households make their housing choices in the transitional housing system. In contrast to the economic and socio-demographic perspectives on housing choices in the Western literature, I argue that a framework incorporating social relationships between the state, work units and employees is needed to understand households’ housing choice in transitional urban China. Associated with housing choices, the homogenous residential pattern in socialist China is gradually changing and a residential sorting is in process. It is also my goal to study the change of residential patterns and its dynamics in urban China.

Four research questions are proposed: (1) What kinds of individual and household characteristics affect housing choice, and how relevant are the existing Western theories? (2) What are the roles of work units in housing choice in transitional urban China? (3) What is the role of the central state in constraining housing choice in transitional urban China? (4) Is a new form of residential pattern emerging? What factors contribute to the change of residential patterns and how relevant are the existing Western theories? A complementary methodology combining both quantitative and qualitative analyses, both national studies and case studies will be employed. The data include a national survey data, in-depth interviews in three cities, and archival data such as housing policies and housing statistics. A multi-level logistic model will be used to examine individual, household, work unit level and state level factors affecting households’ housing choices, and maps on residential patterns will be created.

In this study, the authors use a specialized sample of households in the Atlanta, Georgia metropolitan area to examine the responses of individual households to the pattern of work locations in the region. The objective was to examine how race affects the probability of moving closer to a job when households change residence. Using the data set, the study shows that the commuting behaviors of relatively affluent minority and white households are consistent with the over hall hypothesis that households minimize their commuting distance whenever possible. When socioeconomic status is held constant, there are negligible differences in the responses of white and minority households. It is shown that both household types are likely to move closer to work locations with greater distances from the work location.

Previous research has shown that households are sensitive to commuting distance. A model of the responses to work-residence separation showed that the probability of moving closer to the job was a function of increasing distance from the work place. In particular, households beyond a threshold distance moved closer to the job when they changed residence. The question which is central in this paper is how race affects the probability of moving closer to the job when households change residence. Using a specialized data set the research shows that the commuting behaviors of relatively affluent minority and white households are consistent with the overall hypothesis that households minimize their commuting distance whenever possible. Thus, when we hold socio-economic status constant, there are negligible differences int he responses of white and minority households. Both household types are likely to move closer to their work locations with greater distances from the work location.

Previous research has shown that households are sensitive to commuting distance. In particular, households beyond a threshold distance move closer to the job when they change residence. The questions which motivate this paper are – how does race affect the probability of moving closer to the job when households change residence, and is there a trade off between commuting distance and neighborhood composition? Using a specialized data set the research shows that the commuting behaviors of minority and white households are consistent with the overall hypothesis that households minimize their commuting distance whenever possible. The research also shows that there is a tendency for both white and black households to choose slightly more integrated settings after changing residences. Yet, black households have to juggle the trade-off between neighborhoods with high socio-economic status and commute distance and those who choose higher socio-economic status neighborhoods have longer commutes.

This research uses a longitudinal data set of commuting behavior to test the nature and strength of the association between residential change and employment location. Do households minimize commuting distances when they change residences and what are the differences for one-worker and two-worker households? The analysis utilizes descriptive measures of distance and time to work for pre- and post-residential relocations and develops estimates from a probability model of work-place attraction. We extend earlier research on commuting distances by using a multimodal rather than a monocentric city, by specifically considering the commuting responses of two-worker households and by formally estimating a model of the response to commuting distances. The findings indicate that both one- and two-worker households with greater separation between workplace and residence make decreases in distance and time. Overall, as other studies have shown, women commute shorter distances and are more likely to minimize commuting after a move than are men. The probability model fits the likelihood of decreasing distance with greater separation and provides a more exact specification of the connection between residence and workplace than previous analyses of this relationship.