Social Identity and Settlement Intentions in Urban China: Evidence from CFPS 20142020

Based on micro-survey data from China, this paper systematically examines how social identity characteristics influence individuals' long-term and settlement intentions, focusing on the mechanisms of institutional and economic identities such as the hukou system and occupational structure. This paper considers housing assets as a proxy variable for long-term settlement capacity and uses a two-way fixed effects model to assess the impact of three core identity variablesurban hukou, full-time employment, and agricultural employmenton housing wealth. The results show that urban hukou significantly promotes housing asset accumulation, while agricultural occupations significantly inhibit this capacity. The effect of full-time employment status is unstable, possibly influenced by mobility factors. Further analysis of short-term settlement intentions reveals that both urban hukou and agricultural work positively influence individuals' residential choices, while the direction of the impact of full-time employment is heterogeneous. Furthermore, by introducing a moderation model for urban hukou and non-agricultural occupations, this paper reveals a complementary effect between identity characteristics, indicating that housing wealth accumulation capacity significantly increases and exhibits a complementary amplifying effect only when both are present. This paper expands the theoretical understanding of social identity and settlement behavior, emphasizing the nested relationship between institutional resources and occupational structure as one of the important mechanisms explaining social mobility and spatial governance in China.