The first expert seminar of the CULS4, a major research project of 2015 funded by Shanghai Academy, was held in Beijing during September 28-30, 2015. More than ten experts and scholars from the Institute of Population and Labor Economics of the CASS, the National Bureau of Statistics, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan University and Tsinghua University, took part in the 3-day discussions about the design of questionnaires, sampling and upcoming investigation under the CULS4 project, exchanging ideas and hearing the opinions of relevant experts about project design. The CULS4 will offer the latest and most representative micro-data at home as a comprehensive, deep and scientific reflection of the sustained transformation of the labor market.

The CULS4 will focus on sustained changes in the labor market at the middle income stage, characteristics of the supply, restructuring and upgrading in the labor market, structural changes in enterprise demand, changes in the employment structure, the match between employment demand and supply of labor skills and the rising tension between the need of laborers for better working conditions and the failure of the labor system to make timely response. Such issues are among the major challenges facing China at the middle income stage, as well as the labor market conditions for China to transform its mode and drive economic growth. The latest information about China’s economic restructuring, enterprise upgrading, and match of labor supply must come from a representative survey of the labor market, so as to provide scientific, credible data and research evidence for policy response and adjustment.

Three rounds of the CULS were organized successively in 2001, 2005 and 2010. The CULS4 can not only collect information that reflects the latest changes and adjustments in the labor market, but also offers insight into the changes in labor supply, human capital and the demand for skills, laborers’ response to the labor system, the conditions for enterprises to achieve transformation and improve productivity, and the conditions for the upgrading of the labor market in developed eastern areas during China’s economic development, in combination with the data gained from previous surveys. That will provide a precious micro-research basis for policy makers to respond to the challenges amid the new economic normal at the middle income stage, as well as an important realistic basis for effective policy making and adjustment.

(Qu Xiaobo, Institute of Population and Labor Economics of CASS)