Impact of Social Capital on Chinese Migrant Workers' Poverty during COVID-19: The Mediation of Social Protection

Abstract

Attention to and investigation of migrant workers’ poverty level in the COVID-19 environment are vital for understanding their living conditions. It is also critical to explore the effect of social capital and protection on migrant workers’ poverty alleviation in the post-COVID era. Using an online survey, this study examines the relationship between migrant workers’ social capital and poverty alleviation at the aggregate and dimensional levels from the multidimensional poverty perspective in the COVID-19 environment. We find that, in the COVID-19 environment, migrant workers’ social capital in the cities is notable for mitigating their poverty, and accessible social protection can weaken this relationship at the aggregate level. At the dimensional level, the result shows that migrant workers’ poverty alleviation depends on their social network and reciprocal connections in the cities, not social trust. However, migrant workers’ accessible social protections can mediate the relationship between the three dimensions of social capital and poverty. Our findings provide new evidence for the good and dark sides of the social capital and poverty alleviation relationship. Our result also shows that social protection can mitigate the influence of unequal social capital on poverty to achieve a more balanced result. The findings suggest that governments should design more inclusive but targeted social protection policies for migrant workers to decrease the effect of unequal social capital and so increase the impact on poverty alleviation. JEL classification: D10; I32; J61