Modern Economy, 2012, 3, 557-562
http://dx.doi.org/10.4236/me.2012.35073 Published Online September 2012 (http://www.SciRP.org/journal/me)
Prediction of the Surplus Rate of Rural Labor Force in
China from 2012 to 2050
Wei Wang, Jinfeng Wang, Zhihao Wang
School of Postgraduate, Harbin University of Commerce, Harbin, China
Received May 1, 2012; revised June 10, 2012; accepted June 21, 2012
ABSTRACT
At present, total rural labo r force is abou t 450 million in Chin a, accounting for about 74% of th e total so cial labor force.
According to incomplete statistics, the current working time of each rural labor force less than 100 days each year, of
which about 40% is in the hidden unemployment. A large number of rural surplus labors seriously affected the growth
of agricultural productivity and farmers’ income, impeded the coordinated development of economy and society in
urban and rural areas. Therefore, under the new situation how to effectively estimate hundreds of millions of rural
surplus labor is of great practical significance. In the paper, we assume that if the marginal revenue is different in
various industries or trades, farmers seeking profit maximization will reach the better situation. We can estimate and
predict the surplus rate of rural labor force, regarding the average wage of urban employment workers and agriculture
(forestry, animal husbandry, fisheries) workers as the marginal revenue of urban labor force and rural labor force, based
on fitting curve of exponential function by SPSS statistical software.
Keywords: Rural Labor Force; Surplus Rate; Marginal Revenue; Average Wage; Fitting Curve
1. Introduction
Labor is the most basic of all social existence and de-
velopment. All social wealth in any society is engaged in
production activities, which is the product of human lab or
and nature. No agricultural labor, no existence and de-
velopment of agriculture, then no basis of national eco-
nomy or society. So the agricultural labor is the key
fa ct or o f the existence and develop ment of agriculture and
national economy and society.
From 1990s, capital elements flow into agriculture, th e
more labor can be replaced by the capital in the elements
stru cture of agricult ural inputs, t hus releasin g large amounts
of rural surplus labor. Furthermore, since the reform and
opening up in China, rural surplus labor force piled up
for increasing agricultural labor productivity, promoting
agricultural technology, shrinking arable land and other
factors. Since China realizes the accession to the WTO,
the international agricultural market had had a direct i mpac t
of China agriculture. The other fundamental reasons are
as follows: enormous rural population base, high popu-
lation growth, resulting in a substantial increase of rural
surplus labor, which must be more difficult to solve in
China.
At present, in China the rural areas presents typically
labor resources is surplus to land resources and other
production factors greatly, huge population based on rura l
labor supply has grown faster than the labor demand in
rural economic development. If a large number of surplus
rural labor employment can not be properly solved, not
only human resources is the huge consumption, but the
contradiction of the person and the land will become mor e
prominent, the predatory exploitation of arable land and
other resources will become increasingly serious. T he ref ore,
we must reduce the surplus labor in rural areas, increase
agricultural productivity, and accelerate the implementa-
tion of land scale of operation. In 2007 total arable land
area in China is 18.26 billion mu, per capita is only 1 mu,
only 1/4 of the worl d aver ag e. In Chin a agricultural prod-
uctivity is 1/40 of the United States, 1/20 of France, 1/3
of Japan, which is far below the world average. In China
two outstanding problem of agricultural production is as
follows: the first, land size of agricultural production is
too small. Under land system of kinda contracting, the
blocks of agri-business land are many and scattered. In
mid-1980s, the average scale of operation of agri-busin-
ess land is 9.3 mu, per household contract land was di v i ded
into 9.7. In 1990 average household size was dropped to
8.47 mu, 8.2 per household. Second, the technique of
agricultural production is relatively low. In 1998 cultiva-
ted land in China is only 53.7% of plowing, 17.7% of
mechanized sowing, 9.1% of mechanized harvesting. To
transfer out of a large number of rural surplus labor reso -
urces reasonably is the premise of to achieve the scale of
C
opyright © 2012 SciRes. ME

W. WANG ET AL.
558
operation of agricultural land.
It is necessary to cause further concern and reflection
in a whole society, that how to solve the surplus rural
labor transfer. If such a large number of labor employ-
ment can not be resolved in long-term, it will be bound to
jeopardize social stability, it may become a serious o bs tacl e
to achieve the scientific development objectives. In Ch ina
the modernization goal will be realized, the transfer of
rural surplus labor is a big issue in any case; even some
scholars believe that this is a global and fundamental
issue. If the transfer of rural surplus labor can not be put
in an important agenda, expanded this situation continu-
ously, relied on spontaneous and disorderly transfer of
rural surplus labor, the employment in ru ral areas will be
more die-hard, and seriously impact on economic de-
velopment and social harmony.
In rural areas there are a large number of rural surplus
labor, many experts have different views and estimated
number of rural surplus labo r, the estimated valu e is a far
cry from more than 40 million to 200 million. But no
matter what calculation method i s a consensus, the number
of rural surplus labor is the number of total rural labor
minus the agricultural labor requirements, the key is agri-
cultural labor requirements. Former estimation models of
rural surplus labor are as follows:
1.1. Per Capita Agriculture Production Method
To calculate by a variety of total crop production, regar-
ding per capita production without surplus labor in a year
as the standard, making the degree of mechanization,
fertilizer usage, water use as the factors for the model,
required labor = total crop production/per capita produc-
tion. However, this method is too cumbersome and required
too much data that is difficult to calculate [1,2].
1.2. Production Function Method
Based on Cobb-Douglas production function, from two
production factors of labor and arable land, for Y =
ALdK(1–d), on both sides to take on several purposes, then
LnY = LnA + dLnL + (1–d) LnK. According to an imp-
ortant economic characteristics of the surplus agricultural
labor force, the marginal productivity of labor is zero,
namely the marginal labor productivity of the agricultural
output is zero [3-5]. By calculating the regression model
of time series we identify the year that the sum of labor
and arable land area index is closed to 1 (is generally
1978). The model passes various statistical tests, is a
production function including the total agricultural output
and agricultural labor, cultivated area, Y = C × aLand ×
bLab, where Y is the total output of agriculture, Land is
the arable land, Lab is the agricultural labor requirements.
Forecasting in accordance with this method rural labor
force will be required to be infinite from 2012 to 2050,
the surplus labor force will be infinitely small, which is
impossible as the actual situation, and is more errors as
the real data. The model is unreasonable, for mainly the
factors are ignor ed in applying process of the arable land
can accommodate the labor force, such as agricultural
production (such as the level of agricultural mechanization),
multiple cropping index, management degree, water, fert-
ilizer and so on, the conditions envisaged is too simple
and idealistic, and should be improved in the future.
1.3. Agriculture Arable Land Law
In the calculation of the agricultural labor force require-
ments, agricultural natural resources, production and man -
agement, and agricultu ral policies are the main factors to
determine the agricultural labor demand. In the natural,
social, economic and technical conditions, agricultural
resources, especially arable land has a decisive effect on
the agricultural labor requirements [6,7]. It should be
calculated more reasonably, to regard taking full a dv an ta ge
of the agricultural labor force in 1952 as a fixed period,
based on historical data the agricultural labor force is
calculated as follows:
 
DLtSt t,
Mt0.49661t1952 , 


where DLt is agricultural labor requirements in year t, St
is arable land in year t, Mt is per labor arable land in year
t, 0.4966 is per labor aver age arable land (hectares) from
1949 to 1957, β is the rate of change in cultivated land
(describing the impact on agricultural production and
technological progress in agricultural productivity), the
calculation of β is 0.0018.
2. Prediction Method of the Surplus Rate of
Rural Labor Force
Some economists on behalf of Lewis forecast the number
of surplus rural labor to consider the employment based
on the dual economy in developing countries. Since the
reform and opening up in China, rural industrial develop-
ment has been triple economic structure of agriculture,
rural industry and commerce as well as urban industry
and commerce side by side. Rural surplus labor mainly
presents agricu ltural surplus lab or in rural areas, a ss umin g
that farmers’ economic behavior is rational behavior in
pursuit of profit maximization as the goal, that the mobility
cost of labor force between industries is equivalent or
negligible. Considering this premise, the farmers r ational ly
allocate their own labor by choosing different regions
and industries. As long as the marginal revenue is diff-
erent in various industries or trades, farmers seeking
profit maximization will reach the better situation, and
the final equilibrium condition of the optimal labor allo ca-
tion is that the marginal revenue of labor force is equal

W. WANG ET AL. 559
in industries or trades, MR1 = MR2 = ··· = MRn or AP1
= of AP2 = ··· = APn, where MR is the marginal revenue
of the rural agricultural labor force in each i ndustry or trade,
the AP is the average price or wage of rural agricultural
labor force in each industry or trade.
2.1. Calculating the Marginal Revenue of Labor
Force
Marginal revenue of non-agricultural labor force and
agricultural labor force in rural areas are respectively
represented by the average wage of urban employment
workers and agriculture (forestry, animal husbandry, fish-
eries) workers in China Stat istical Yearbook ( 2010), which
totally showed increasing trend year by year. Marginal
revenue of agricultural labor force has increased from
1541 yuan to 12,958 yuan from 1990 to 2009. Marginal
revenue of non-agricultural labor force has increased fr om
2140 yuan to 32,244 yuan from 1990 to 2009. We can u se
fitting curve of exponential function to predict the labor
force from 2012 to 2050 by SPSS statistical software.
2.2. Calculating the Surplus Rate of Rural Labor
Force
Todaro, a American development economist, made a real
flows model of rural labor tending to the urban in 1969.
He believes that the determining factors is economic s tru c-
ture differences of rural areas and the urban, transferable
rural labor migrating to industrial sectors considers the
trade-offs of migration costs and benefits, therefore, the
flows power is the difference of the expected income
level of the urban and rural areas and urban employment
probability. The lure of higher and long-lasting income
will attract the transferable rural labor increasingly to
crowded urban slums. The view of Todaro is the more
stimulating and reference for our calculation method [8].
Labor is a means of people’s livelihood, aiming to make
a living and improve quality of life, people preferred to
high labor remuneration of industry sectors in their re-
employment, rather than low labor remuneration of that.
Therefore, the supply of agricultural labor was decided
by the level of economic benefits, labor income, in the
agricultural sectors.
We assume that the expected income is equal to the
the annual average wage in the next year, following the
migration theory of Todaro, so the calculation formula is
as follows:
SRLMRMR1MRor SLRAR AR1 AR
where SRL is the surplus rate of rural labor force, MR1 i s
the expected income of agricultural labor force, MR is th e
expected income of non-agricultural labor force, AR1 is
the annual average wage of agricultural labor force, AR is
the annual average wage of non-agricultural labor force.
3. Calculations of the Surplus Rate of Rural
Labor Force
3.1. Prediction of Marginal Revenue of
Agricultural Labor Force
We can get the average wage of agricultural workers
(forestry, animal husband ry, fisher ies) from 1952 to 2009
in China Statistical Yearbook (2010) [9], and draw a se-
quence diagram by SPSS statistical software as shown in
Figure 1.
According to the sequence tendency in Figure 1, we
use exponential function, Y = aXbt, to fit the average
wage of agricultural workers by SPSS statistical software,
the results are as follows:
From the above Tables 1 and 2, we can see R = 0.990,
R2 = 0.981, Sig = 0.000, then conclude that exponential
function fits well [10,11]. The concrete fitting curve is
shown in Figure 2.
Figure 1. The average wage sequence of agricultural labor
force.
Table 1. Model summary of the sequence.
R R Square Adjusted R Square Std. Error of the
Estimate
0.9900.981 0.980 0.131
Table 2. ANOVA of the sequence.
Sum of
Squares df Mean Square F Sig.
Regression 21.307 1 21.307 1244.9990.000
Residual 0.411 24 0.017
Total 21.718 25

W. WANG ET AL.
560
Figure 2. Fitting the average wage of agricultural labor force.
From the above Tab le 3, fitting function of the ma rg i na l
revenue of agricultural labor force can be got as follows:
0.121 t
7 X 
0.104 t
4 X 
Y=585.02 (1)
Using the above fitting function (1), the marginal
revenue of agricultural labor force can be forecasted
from 2012 to 2050 as shown in Table 4.
3.2. Prediction of Marginal Revenue of
Non-Agricultural Labor Force
We can get the average wage of urban employment
workers from 1978 to 2009 in Ch ina Statistical Yearbook
(2010) [8]. As the method of forecasting the marginal
revenue of agricultural labor force, we use exponential
function, Y=aXbt, to fit the average wage of urban empl-
oyment workers by SPSS statistical software, the results
are as follows: R = 0.967, R2 = 0.935, Sig = 0.000. The
concrete fitting curve is shown in Figure 3, further from
the Table 5, the fitting function of the marginal revenue
of agricultural labor force can be got as follows:
Y=221.73 (2)
Using the above fitting functi on (2), the marginal revenue
of non-agricultural labor force can be forecasted from
2012 to 2050 as shown in Table 6.
3.3. Prediction of the Surplus Rate of Rural
Labor Force
The formula of the surplus rate of rural labor force is as
follows:
SRLARAR1 AR ,
where SRL is the surplus rate of rural labor force, AR1 is
the annual average wage of agricultural labor force, AR
is the annual average wage of non-agricultural labor for c e,
the results can be seen from Table 7.
Table 3. Coefficients of the fitting function (1).
Unstandardized
Coefficients Standardized Coefficients
B Std. Error Beta t Sig.
Case Sequence0.121 0.003 0.990 35.2850.000
(Constant) 585.02730.906 18.929 0.000
The depende nt variable is ln(V AR00001).
Table 4. Prediction of the marginal revenue of agricultural
labor force.
Time The average wage of agricultural labor force (yuan)
2012 22063.02
2013 24900.87
2014 28103.74
2015 31718.58
2016 35798.38
2017 40402.95
2018 45599.77
2019 51465.04
2020 58084.73
2021 65555.87
2022 73987.99
2023 83504.68
2024 94245.47
2025 106367.8
2026 120049.3
2027 135490.7
2028 152918.1
2029 172587.2
2030 194786.2
2031 219840.6
2032 248117.6
2033 280031.7
2034 316050.7
2035 356702.7
2036 402583.6
2037 454365.9
2038 512808.6
2039 578768.6
2040 653212.6
2041 737232.1
2042 832058.5
2043 939081.9
2044 1,059,871
2045 1,196,197
2046 1,350,058
2047 1,523,709
2048 1,719,696
2049 1,940,892
2050 2,190,539

W. WANG ET AL. 561
Figure 3. Fitting the average wage of non-agricultural labor
force.
Table 5. Coefficients of the fitting function (2).
Unstandardized
Coefficients Standardized Coefficients
B Std. ErrorBeta t Sig.
Case Sequence 0.104 0.004 0.967 24.6020.000
(Constant) 221.734 24.209 9.159 0.000
The depende nt variable is ln(V AR00001).
Seen from Table 7, applying the exponential function
to fit the average wage data, we find that the surplus rate
of rural labor force is decreasing year by year from 2012
to 2029, and reaches the minimum in 2029, 0.00118,
which implies the marginal revenue of agricultural and
non-agricultural labor force tends to be balance in 2029,
namely rural labor force stop seeking the profit maxim-
ization to migrate to urban.
We predict the surplus rate of rural labor force re-
sumes increasing after 2029, the rural labor force may
remain in the rural areas during the process of the ur-
banization of C hina.
4. Conclusion
At present, the contradiction of total supply and demand
of rural surplus labor force is intertwined in China, and
the total supply is greater than the demand, bu t it is more
serious that the skills of rural surplus labor force can not
match with industrial structure changes. Migrant worker
are a very special group of the urbanization process in
China. So we want to know how many is the labor force
transferred from rural area? What is the population struc-
ture of the rural labor force remaining in rural area?
Whether or not transferable rural labor supports new ru-
ral construction and meets the needs of agricultural de-
Table 6. Prediction of the marginal revenue of non-agricult-
velopment. In the long run, the supply capacity of trans-
wage of non-agricultural labor force (yuan)
ural labor force.
Time The average
2012 29421.43*
2013 32646.03*
2014 36224.05
2015 40194.22
2016 44599.52
2017 49487.65
2018 54911.52
2019 60929.85
2020 67607.79
2021 75017.63
2022 83239.6
2023 92362.7
2024 102485.7
2025 113718.2
2026 126181.7
2027 140011.3
2028 155356.6
2029 172383.8
2030 191277.1
2031 212241.2
2032 235502.9
2033 261314.1
2034 289954.3
2035 321733.4
2036 356995.5
2037 396122.4
2038 439537.6
2039 487711.1
2040 541164.4
2041 600476.3
2042 666288.8
2043 739314.3
2044 820343.5
2045 910253.5
2046 1,010,018
2047 1,120,716
2048 1,243,547
2049 1,379,840
2050 1,531,072
*Dtting error of the constant,lue is lower than the
ferable rural labor from ruraarea to the urban is also the
ue to fi the forecast va
actual value.
l
important factors of the industrialization and urbanize-
tion of China. Therefore, dynamic changes of transfer-
able rural labor must be paid sustained attention and re-
searched deeply, which has an important significance to
improve the relative policy of decision making depart-
ments, aiming to establish the personnel compat ible with
the economic and social development.

W. WANG ET AL.
562
f rura l l abor force.
Time
Ta ble 7 . Cal c ula t i ons of t he surp lus ra t e o
Absolute difference of the the surplus rate of rural labor
average wage force（%）
2012 7358.41 0.250104
2013 7745.16 0.237247
2014 8120.31 0.224169
2015 8475.64 0.210867
2016 8801.14 0.197337
2017 9084.7 0.183575
2018 9311.75 0.169577
2019 9464.81 0.155339
2020 9523.06 0.140857
2021 9461.76 0.126127
2022 9251.61 0.111144
2023 8858.02 0.095905
2024 8240.23 0.080404
2025 7350.4 0.064637
2026 6132.4 0.0486
2027 4520.6 0
0.
.032287
2028 2438.5 0.015696
2029 203.4 0.00118
2030 3509.1 0.01835
2031 7599.4 0.03581
2032 12614.7 0.05356
2033 18717.6 0.07163
2034 26096.4 0.09
2035 34969.3 10869
2036 45588.1 0.1277
2037 58243.5 0.14703
2038 73,271 0.1667
2039 91057.5 0.1867
2040 112048.2 0.20705
2041 136755.8 0.22775
2042 165769.7 0.2488
2043 199767.6 0.27021
2044 239527.5 0.29198
2045 285943.5 0.31414
2046 340,040 0.33667
2047 402,993 0.35959
2048 476,149 0.3829
2049 561,052 0.40661
2050 659,467 0.43072
5. Acknowledgements
This research was financially supported by the Humanities
and Social Sciences Fund of Ministry of Education under
Grant 12YJC790190 in China, the Social Science Foun-
dation under Grant 08C066 and the Youth Science Tech-
nology Foundation under Grant QC07C117 in Heilong-
jiang Province.
REFERENCES
[1] C. Wang, “Employment Transition in China: From Hid-
den Unemployment and under Employment to the Effi-
ciency Employment,” Economic Research, No. 5, 1996,
pp. 38-46.
[2] T. Rawski, “On the Number of Agricultural Labor Force
in China,” China Rural Survey, No. 4, 1997, pp. 28-39.
[3] H. L. Wang, “Empirical Analysis on the Estimation of the
Number of Agricultural Surplus Labor,” Economic Re-
search, No. 4, 1998, pp. 52-59.
[4] F. Y. Hou, “Empirical Analysis on the Surplus Scale and
Mobility Scale of Rural Labor Force in China,” China
Rural Economy, No. 3, 2004, pp. 13-21.
[5] R. J. Wang, “Actively Exploring New Ways of Surplus
Labor Transfer in China,” Theoretical Study, No. 1, 2004,
pp. 5-7.
[6] H. Y. Chen, Z. L. Li and T. Wu, “Structural Model and
Optimization of the Transfer of Agricultural Surplus La-
bor,” Productivity of the System, No. 1, 1997, pp. 11-13.
[7] J. J. Liu, “Transfer of Rural Labor and Non-formal Em-
ployment Opportunities,” Economic Information Daily,
Vol. 12, No. 24, 2003, p. 5.
[8] M. P. Todaro, “A Model of Labor Migration and Urban
Unemployment in Less Developed Countries,” American
Economic Review, No. 59, 1969, pp. 138-148.
[9] National Bureau of Statistics, “China Statistical Year-
book,” China Statistics Press, Beijing, 2010.
[10] L. Z. Li, “Age Structure and Gender-specific Population
Growth Mode,” Journal of Xuzhou Normal University
(Natural Science), Vol. 26, No. 2, 2008, pp. 124-127.
[11] L. X. Yang, G. S. Yang and S. F. Yuan, “Mathematical
Models in Population Prediction, for Example as Jiangsu
Province,” Changsha Resources and Environment, Vol.
15, No. 3, 2006, pp. 288-290.