The husband-wife occupations significantly influence a family’s economic condition, social capital, and everyday experience. Changes in spousal occupations forms a major aspect of transformation in Chinese families over the twentieth century. Ying Dai of Chinese Academy of Social Sciences and her co-author utilise 175 lineage genealogies with 57,501 couples to examine the spousal occupations of the Yangtze Valley from the perspectives of endogamy, within-sex alignment, and cross-sex alignment. Endogamy denotes the tendency of individuals to marry within their own occupation compared to marrying someone from a different occupation. The data suggest that endogamy fluctuated in a narrow range with a trend of increase among cohorts born between 1880 and 1941, then increased substantially for those born from 1951 onwards. Within-sex alignment stands for women from the same occupation tend to marry men in a limited set of occupations. The data suggest that within-sex alignment fluctuated among cohorts born between 1881 and 1950 and increased among later-born cohorts, reaching its lowest point among those born between 1941 and 1950. Cross-sex alignment refers to the tendency of women to marry those from the occupations which are popular for their male peers in the same occupation. The data suggest that cross-sex alignment was negative, suggesting gendered partner choices: even when men and women share the same occupation, they tend to marry spouses from distinctly different occupations.  In this Quantitative History Webinar, Ying Dai will explain that the spousal occupations are shaped by both marriage formation and post-marriage occupational decisions. Opportunities to meet are influenced by gendered occupational structures, geographical mobility, and the mechanisms through which individuals meet potential partners. Partner preferences are shaped by economic and social capital, the division of labour within the household, and the balance of decision-making power between individuals and their parents. After marriage, occupational decisions are further influenced by the prevalence of family-based economy and domestic division of labour.

Ying Dai’s co-author: Jingying Wang, PhD candidate, Institute of Sociology, University of Zurich

Discussant: Qingxu Yang, Post-doctoral Fellow, HKU Business School