The Impact of Agricultural Labor Migration on the Urban–Rural Dual Economic Structure: The Case of Liaoning Province, China
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report (Previous Reviewer 1)
This is my second time I am reviewing this manuscript, so, some of my comments / observations are on the same line like the previous one. As the first comments, the actual version of the manuscript is improved.
As I mentioned before, the authors submitted a manuscript that is interesting, and it is linked to the objectives of the journal, however, there are some issues that have to be reconsidered.
The objective of the manuscript is to analyse the impact of agricultural labour mitigation on the urban‒rural dual economic structure from the spatial dimension in Liaoning Province, China.
The topic addressed is relevant for the journal and for the field, as large. The aimed gap is un-insufficient review spatial related to flow of agricultural labour and underestimates its effect on optimizing the urban‒rural dual economic structure, a subject that is, at the moment, insufficiently exploited by other scholars. The construction of the identified gap was improved, by consulting additional literature.
The subject is rather interesting and seems not to be sufficiently approached by other scholars, so there is room for this manuscript, once it reaches the expected level of quality.
In The Abstract the authors are asked not to use abbreviations.
For better visibility on databases, the authors are asked, again, not to repeat among keywords the words/concepts included in the title of the article. Entering different words in the title and in the keywords can improve the search for the paper in metasearch engines and internet databases.
In the introduction, in was added the structure of the paper and not it is easier to follow it.
The part of the Literature Review has now a dedicated part, called 2. Theoretical Analysis. It is sad that only 7 references were used for this part, as this should describe the state of art on the field. In such a case, looks quite superficial and offers limited information for discussion and conclusions part. It is advisable to improve it by consulting additional relevant refences.
The methodology was, also, improved. Now the “material” (Liaoning Province, China) is better presented and easier to understand.
The results go with the flow of the manuscript. They are consistent and in line with the used methodology.
The discussion benefitted by an improvement. But, as the literature review is weak, the discussion part cannot be good, either.
The conclusions are on line with the results.
The references are valid but not consistent as, again, the literature review is still inconclusive.
The tables and figures. are clear and enough
Author Response
February. 28th, 2023
Re: The Impact of Agricultural Labour Transfer on the Urban‒Rural Dual Economic Structure: The case of Liaoning Province, China
Dear Editor,
My co-authors and I appreciate the comments and suggestions by the reviewers and we have made corrections accordingly. The specifics of the revisions are detailed in the following pages.
We sincerely hope that you find the revised paper publishable.
Best regards,
Zhe Zhao
Associate Professor
Liaoning University, Shenyang, China
Email: [email protected]
Response to Comments from Reviewer 1
Reviewer:
This is my second time I am reviewing this manuscript, so, some of my comments / observations are on the same line like the previous one. As the first comments, the actual version of the manuscript is improved.
As I mentioned before, the authors submitted a manuscript that is interesting, and it is linked to the objectives of the journal, however, there are some issues that have to be reconsidered.The authors submitted a manuscript that is interesting, and it is linked to the objectives of the journal, however, there are some issues that have to be reconsidered.
Reviewer(1)：
In The Abstract the authors are asked not to use abbreviations.
Response:
Thanks for your suggestion. We have deleted the abbreviations（SDM and GTWR）, the specific revisions please the original article.
Reviewer(2)：
For better visibility on databases, the authors are asked, again, not to repeat among keywords the words/concepts included in the title of the article. Entering different words in the title and in the keywords can improve the search for the paper in metasearch engines and internet databases.
Response:
Thanks for your suggestion. We have changed the keywords to “ Lewis turning point; integrated development; unified urban and rural labor market; spatial spillover effect”.
Reviewer(3)：
In the introduction, in was added the structure of the paper and not it is easier to follow it.
Response:
Thanks for your suggestion. I have referred to some existing literature and generally put the article structure in the last paragraph of Introduction. You mean put it in a more visible position？
Reviewer(4)：
The part of the Literature Review has now a dedicated part, called 2. Theoretical Analysis. It is sad that only 7 references were used for this part, as this should describe the state of art on the field. In such a case, looks quite superficial and offers limited information for discussion and conclusions part. It is advisable to improve it by consulting additional relevant refences.
Response:
Thanks for your suggestion. We have expanded and enriched this part. The revised statement is as follows:
“2.Theoretical Analysis
2.1 Lewis' theory of dual economy and urban‒rural dual economic structure
At present, an important manifestation of and reason for the rural–urban dual economic structure is the division of the labor market between urban and rural areas. To break the rural–urban dual economic structure and realize the integrated development of urban and rural industries, the unified labor market of urban and rural areas must be established [33]. From the perspective of explaining the reasons for the current urban and rural labor market segmentation and putting forward targeted solutions, the existing research can be roughly divided into the category of institutional economics and the category of neoclassical economics. The former believes that the current urban and rural labor market segmentation is due to the insufficient institutional reform of the government, so it is necessary to further promote the reform of the administrative system; eliminating institutional discrimination in employment and social security can achieve urban and rural labor market integration [34-36]. However, the latter insisted on the views of neoclassical economists represented by Marshall, Pigou, and Hicks, who believed that the market played a decisive role in determining the wage level of labors, labor resource regions, and industrial allocation, and that the long-term segmentation of urban and rural labor markets was the result of inadequate economic development and incomplete market system construction. It is an important manifestation of the unbalanced initial allocation of resources and low level of economic development [37-38]. In fact, these two views are unified opposites. The shortage of institutional supply is an important reason for the long-term unbalanced development of urban–rural relations in China. Therefore, the construction of a unified urban–rural labor market requires the joint efforts of the government and the market, which requires the basic logic of adhering to the market allocation of resources [39]. By deepening the reform, removing the institutional obstacles in the administrative system that are inconsistent with the phased characteristics of the labor force and the development of the unified urban and rural labor market, and giving better play to the role of the government's macro-control on the basis of following the law of the market allocation of labor resources, we may minimize the loss of production efficiency caused by the distortion of the factor market [40].
Lewis' dual economic theory explains the path and standard of urban–rural integration development from the perspective of labor flow between urban and rural industries. "The infinite expansion of industrial sector and the continuous outflow of labor force within agricultural sector" will eventually cause the income of the industrial sector and agricultural sector to reach a balance—that is, the "second turning point" of labor flow. The realization of the integration of urban and rural labor market allocation coincides with the basic market logic, realization approach, and vision of urban and rural unified labor market construction. In fact, Lewis' dual economic theory was proposed in describing the process of labor mobility to achieve urban–rural integration with two turning points [13]. The first turning point was that the surplus agricultural labor force changed from an infinite supply to a limited supply and the wage level of the transferred labor force began to rise. The second turning point was the convergence of marginal returns between agricultural and non-agricultural industries [13, 41]. Between the two turning points is the Lewis turning interval, where the surplus labor and wage rise coexist. The industrial allocation of the agricultural labor force in pursuit of higher returns changed the element structure of traditional agricultural labor density, and gradually increased the ratio of land to labor and capital to labor in agricultural production, thus beginning the process of the modernization of traditional agriculture. The transformation process of the dual economic structure is combined with the agricultural development stage. The two turning points basically divide the agricultural development into three stages: traditional agriculture, industrial agriculture, and modern agriculture. It is a perspective from which to judge the Lewis turning point to analyze the conditions that need to be met in the transition stage, especially the conditions of the transition from industrial agriculture to modern agriculture [12].
On the one hand, the key to crossing the first turning point lies in breaking the Malthusian Equilibrium of agricultural production. Endowment resources such as labor and land are the basic inputs of traditional agriculture. Due to the large amount of surplus labor force in agricultural production, labor-intensive technological progress has narrow space and low efficiency, and the increase in per capita output brought by limited technological progress only translates into population growth. Per capita income has been in the Malthusian Equilibrium steady state for a long time, and its marginal rate of return is zero or even negative before crossing. An external factor that breaks the equilibrium state is the rural–urban migration caused by the excessive factor yield gap between the industrial and agricultural sectors. When the absorption rate of urban labor force is greater than the growth rate of the rural population (labor), it is conducive to triggering large-scale capital entry into agricultural production, the capital return rate starts to rise, and the agricultural production function is transformed into the Solow Model.
On the other hand, the key to crossing the second turning point lies in the transition from the industrial agriculture stage to the modern agriculture stage. As labor left the agricultural sector and capital entered agricultural production on a large scale, the agricultural production function changed, and the relative scarcity of labor made the marginal output of agriculture rise continuously until it was equal to the actual wage level of labor, resulting in the return of human capital represented by knowledge and skills higher than the marginal rate of return of labor [42]. The return on capital has experienced a process from low to high to low. In the early stage, due to the relative scarcity of capital, capital represented by agricultural technology such as machinery and fertilizer has a high rate of return, replacing labor as a key input in agricultural production. In the later stage, under the influence of the law of diminishing marginal returns, capital cannot become the source of sustainable growth in agricultural production, and the rate of return drops. In this way, the capital–labor ratio keeps increasing, forcing labor to invest in human capital to match the high material agricultural production. Abundant capital input will reduce the return on capital, provide a wide profit space for the total factors represented by technology, promote agricultural upgrading, and realize the final transformation of the dual economic structure.
The research of Fei Jinghan and Ranis supplemented Lewis' theory, arguing that in the process of labor transfer, the non-agricultural sector will also show a rise in labor productivity; they believed that this phenomenon occurred because, in the process of labor transfer, the supply of agricultural labor to non-agricultural industries changed from infinite to limited and then became scarce [43-44]. At this time, the structure of factor input was optimized within agriculture due to labor transfer, thus improving the output level of the transferred labor [45]. However, it focuses on the description of this process and does not analyze the causes of this process from the perspective of factor input and the production process.”
Reviewer(5)：
The discussion benefitted by an improvement. But, as the literature review is weak, the discussion part cannot be good, either.
Response:
Thanks for your suggestion. We have modified this part. The revised statement is as follows:
“The results of this paper also show that the income distribution system has an obvious role in optimizing the urban‒rural dual economic structure, but the effect has been weakening in recent years, indicating that the current income distribution system still has difficulty meeting the needs of social and economic development. Additionally, basic public services are unequal and incomplete urbanization will also hinder the transfer of the agricultural labor force. To some extent, the inequality degree of urban and rural residents enjoying basic public services is even larger than the income gap. For example, the gap between the urbanization rate of permanent residents and the urbanization rate of the registered residence population is 18.5%, a total of 260 million people, most of whom are migrant workers and cannot enjoy the same basic public services as the registered population, including children's education, social security, and subsistence allowances. In fact, it is the result of both the system and market that the urban and rural labor market is imperfect at present. In particular, under the urban–rural dual system, influenced by the development strategy of production factors favoring cities, the distribution system favoring citizens, and the industrial structure favoring heavy industry, there are certain institutional obstacles preventing workers from freely choosing jobs in urban and rural industries, which also forms a group of "migrant workers" with Chinese characteristics. This group has both the identity of farmers and citizens in life, and participates in the production activities of both agricultural and non-agricultural industries. Therefore, solving the duality of the identity and employment of "migrant workers" is also a key step to realize the integration of urban and rural development. Moreover, the existing household registration system results in the incompleteness of urbanization, which further reduces social mobility. The lack of social mobility is reflected in many aspects, among which informal employment is an important factor. At present, informal employment accounts for at least 30% of all employment in China; this phenomenon is an important reason for the low wages and the high proportion of people with low wages.”
Reviewer(6)：
The references are valid but not consistent as, again, the literature review is still inconclusive.
Response:
Thanks for your suggestion. We have checked the references.
In addition, we have thoroughly revised the sentences of the full paper through the English editing service provided by MDPI.
Reviewer 2 Report (New Reviewer)
Line 109 to 112 doesn’t add value to this section which is the subsequent parts, so removing them is recommended.
Line 115-116 different factor endowment of two sector is not clear? Is it wage or labour or rural urban?-better to mention those two sectors ( e.g…,)
Line 118-119 There are two turning points in this process, depending on the size of the labour force and what happens to wages- sentence not clear.
Line 119-122
“Before the turning point I is the stage of infinite supply of labour force, the continuous transfer of labour force will not cause the increase of marginal productivity. After the turning point II, the economic development pattern of industry and agriculture is unitary, and the wage rate is determined by the competition mechanism of the labour market”- are the authors referring to any figures??? The turning point I and II introduced here is not clear to the readers.
Section 3- better to rephrase it to materials and methodology- line195
Line 316-317 full stop before citation[13] should be removed.
Line 469-471 is not clear-“The results of this paper have certain reference significance for explore the development path of urban-rural integration in areas with net population outflow, and the follow-up research can be further discussed on a more macro scale”.- Restructuring is needed.
Line 478-“The cultivation of new farmers and new agricultural operators should also be strengthened”- is not clear to the readers.
Author Response
February. 28th, 2023
Re: The Impact of Agricultural Labour Transfer on the Urban‒Rural Dual Economic Structure: The case of Liaoning Province, China
Dear Editor,
My co-authors and I appreciate the comments and suggestions by the reviewers and we have made corrections accordingly. The specifics of the revisions are detailed in the following pages.
We sincerely hope that you find the revised paper publishable.
Best regards,
Zhe Zhao
Associate Professor
Liaoning University, Shenyang, China
Email: [email protected]
Response to Comments from Reviewer 2
Reviewer(1)：
Line 109 to 112 doesn’t add value to this section which is the subsequent parts, so removing them is recommended.abbreviations.
Response:
Thanks for your suggestion. This part was not available before, but another reviewer suggested adding it, so we added it. If I delete it now, another reviewer might ask again
Reviewer(2)：
Line 115-116 different factor endowment of two sector is not clear? Is it wage or labour or rural urban?-better to mention those two sectors ( e.g…,)
Line 118-119 There are two turning points in this process, depending on the size of the labour force and what happens to wages- sentence not clear.
Response:
Thanks for your suggestion. We have modified this part, the revised statement is as follows:
“ In fact, Lewis' dual economic theory was proposed in describing the process of labor mobility to achieve urban–rural integration with two turning points [13].”
Reviewer(3)：
Line 119-122
“Before the turning point I is the stage of infinite supply of labour force, the continuous transfer of labour force will not cause the increase of marginal productivity. After the turning point II, the economic development pattern of industry and agriculture is unitary, and the wage rate is determined by the competition mechanism of the labour market”- are the authors referring to any figures??? The turning point I and II introduced here is not clear to the readers.
Response:
Thanks for your suggestion. We have modified this and added references to the literature, the revised statement is as follows:
“The first turning point was that the surplus agricultural labor force changed from an infinite supply to a limited supply and the wage level of the transferred labor force began to rise. The second turning point was the convergence of marginal returns between agricultural and non-agricultural industries [13, 41].”
Reviewer(4)：
Section 3- better to rephrase it to materials and methodology- line195.
Response:
Thanks for your suggestion. We have modified it to Materials and Methodology.
Reviewer(5)：
Line 316-317 full stop before citation[13] should be removed.
Response:
Thanks for your suggestion. We have removed it.
Reviewer(6)：
Line 469-471 is not clear-“The results of this paper have certain reference significance for explore the development path of urban-rural integration in areas with net population outflow, and the follow-up research can be further discussed on a more macro scale”.- Restructuring is needed.
Response:
Thanks for your suggestion. We have removed this sentence.
Reviewer(7)：
Line 469-471 is not clear-“The results of this paper have certain reference significance for explore the development path of urban-rural integration in areas with net population outflow, and the follow-up research can be further discussed on a more macro scale”.- Restructuring is needed.
Response:
Thanks for your suggestion. We have modified it to “The training for new types of professional farmers should also be strengthened”
In addition, we have thoroughly revised the sentences of the full paper through the English editing service provided by MDPI.
Author Response File: 
Author Response.docx
Round 2
Reviewer 1 Report (Previous Reviewer 1)
The authors address my concerns, I may opinion the manuscript can be published.
Congratulations and good luck!
This manuscript is a resubmission of an earlier submission. The following is a list of the peer review reports and author responses from that submission.
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
The authors submitted a manuscript that is interesting, and it is linked to the objectives of the journal, however, there are some issues that have to be reconsidered.
The objective of the manuscript is to analyse the impact of agricultural labour transfer on the urban‒rural dual economic structure from the spatial dimension in Liaoning Province, China.
The topic addressed is relevant for the journal and for the field, as large. The aimed gap is un-insufficient review spatial related to flow of agricultural labour and underestimates its effect on optimizing the urban‒rural dual economic structure, a subject that is, at the moment, insufficiently exploited by other scholars. The construction of the identified gap weak, as the literature review is insufficient presented.
The subject is rather interesting and seems not to be sufficiently approached by other scholars, so there is room for this manuscript, once it reaches the expected level of quality.
The Abstract is missing by describing the importance of the subjects and place of this study on the literature, at large. The abstract should be the high-level summary of a paper and not a simple enumeration of some points grabbed from the paper.
For better visibility on databases, the authors are asked not to repeat among keywords the words/concepts included in the title of the article. Entering different words in the title and in the keywords can improve the search for the paper in metasearch engines and internet databases.
In the introduction, the presentation of the structure of the paper is missing.
The part of the Literature Review is almost missing, it is needed a dedicated section for it, to construct the literature gap. General text about the topic (one para), focus on its relevance and importance for the industry, practice, and theory. Then briefly inform readers that there is a surge in wellness experience, and xx and xx studies have been organized so far. One para on what has been done so far on the topic. Then talk about research gaps- What are the keys and why are they important or need to be addressed now? Clearly present 3-4 research gaps on this topic. Finally, present the focus of the current study. What are its RQs and details on the method – briefly say about data, country, context, and theory. Which is the novelty and contribution of the study?
The methodology part sounds solid and it is well conceptualized. It is a good base to reliably of the achieved results. A map of the country showing the studied are could help scholars to better understand the results. The entire part of material (Liaoning Province, China) is not well presented, not offering the starting information to understand the particularities of the region and to have a comparable base for the results.
The results go with the flow of the manuscript. They are consistent and in line with the used methodology.
The discussion part shows an adequate comparison of the results with the previous literature; however, the authors must emphasize the contribution of the manuscript to the literature, leading to theoretical implications. That means creating an adequate literature review.
The conclusions are failing to presents the limits of the research.
The references are valid but not consistent as, again, the literature review is almost missing.
The tables and figures. are clear and enough (but see the comment regarding the necessity of a map of the country showing the studied area).
Reviewer 2 Report
The author has talked about a very interesting and meaningful topic regarding on the impact of rural labor migration on the urban-rural dual structure in China, this is a valuable question in China, this is an interesting research topic, generally speaking, the paper organized well, while I have a lot of comments and problems below:
(1) I have read clearly of the paper, yes, it is a good topic to discuss. The first problem is in the abstract, normally, we usually use “labor migration” and not “labor transfer” we can say land transfer, farmland transfer.
(2) In the introduction, you have said that you used the panel data of 14 regions in Liaoning province, I don’t think it is a good choice to use the data in Liaoning, if you want to survey and research the urban-rural dual economic structure, some central areas may be a good choice, and the labor migration may happen more in some central-west areas, you should give some reasons and explanations for the samples selection.
(3) I don’t think the policy recommendation “speeding up the reform of the land system, household registration system and social security system, and smoothing the circulation of production factors” are good suggestion. These policies are quite “empty”, why speeding the land reform can have positive role in labor migration? It is also a big research problem need to research, your policy suggestion should be more specific and are strictly following by your research results and conclusion.
(4) I think the most problem in this paper is that you lacks of a clear theoretical analysis framework, this is a very big problem for a scientific research article, I suggest you to construct a theoretical framework diagram, which to construct the relationship between agricultural surplus labor migration and the urban-rural dual economic structure, use a diagram to present the “Optimal effect” and “spill-over effect” and explain how and why it influences the urban-rural dual economic structure.
(5) some symbols in the equation (1) and the expression in the paragraph are inconsistent, even I understand what it is, while you need to check and keep them consistent in order to not make misunderstanding.
(6) You at least explain why you choose this control variables? According to some scholar’s' research and literature and confirm that you haven’t lost some important control variables.
(7) Some formatting problems, such as in “Cai (2021) reached similar conclusions”, the reference should put the correct place. You should say less regarding on the control variables and say more regarding on the labor migration, your key variables.
(8) You have already researched the impacts of agricultural labor migration on the dual contrast coefficient (dual economic structure) and also have research the impact of agricultural labor migration whether have a increase/reduce effect on the surrounding areas (adjacent areas), helps/weaken the resource allocation and income gaps. Now, you continue analysis the difference and heterogeneity/ imbalance of these influence in Western/central/Eastern areas? Do you really need these analysis? And I think you should tell the readers the relationship and the meaningful before you start the heterogeneity analysis. ……
(9) I think the authors have a very important finding, that the influence of RTL is always s negative on the whole, while the impacts has been decreased with the time order and reaches stability after 2013, what is the meaning, what is the inner mechanisms, it is consistent with the Lewis turning interval, this should be strength the mechanism analysis and it is more interesting than the western, central and Eastern difference/imbalance, and should be further explored.
(10) I think the author have not organized well the discussion section, the aspects of the reason hindering the common prosperity should be put in the introduction, not in the discussion section, you should always talk about your key variable and put foundation for your conclusion and policy recommendation. The discussion section always talked about some phenomenon and cannot integrated well your findings with the current policy demands. The policy suggestions are all the current “policy slogan” and cannot clearly found from your conclusion, that means without reading your paper, we can still find these policy implications.
I have very clearly read your paper and give my suggestions for the improvement of your paper. I hope you can absorb these comments and do great improvements for your manuscript. Hence, the paper cannot be accepted at the current stage.
Comments for author File: 
Comments.pdf
