Estimated at 250 million people, China's migrant labor force is the largest in the world. Two main factors have contributed to its emergence in recent decades: first, the surplus labor made available by China's transition from a primarily agricultural economy to an export-oriented industrial economy since the 1980s; second, the rapid development along the coast that made it the logical destination for much of that surplus labor. These workers provided the country with a near-inexhaustible supply of cheap labor for unskilled manufacturing and infrastructure construction along the coast, which in large part sustained the country's economic miracle. But now it appears migration patterns in China are changing. In recent years, fewer people have moved to the coasts seeking work and more migrant workers already on the coasts have moved back inland. According to official estimates, returned migrant workers employed in central and western provinces accounted for 34.3 percent of total migrant employment by 2011, a 5.7 percent increase from 2008. In particular, southwest Sichuan and central Henan provinces — which together account for nearly 20 percent of the country's total migrant workers — saw a 50 percent increase in migrant workers returning to work in the provinces over the past five years. In fact, in both provinces, intraprovincial employment of migrant workers has already surpassed the number of those who are employed outside the province. This shifting labor pattern could prove a temporary relief for Beijing, since maintaining employment is critical for China's social stability and the industrial hubs on the coast are no longer able to provide jobs for nearly every available low-skilled worker as they did in previous years. It also fits into China's plan to develop its inland economy so that region can take over most low-skill manufacturing and embark on urbanization, freeing up the manufacturing centers on the coasts to do more advanced, value-added activity and thereby facilitating China's transition to consumption-based economic model.
