Drawing upon data from a sample survey of urban residents conducted in July 2005 in Shenzhen and Chongqing,this paper examines and compares income distribution structure in the two cities.The technique of inequality decomposition by population subgroups has been used to study the effects of the Population Characteristics on income inequality.There is a much higher income inequality index in Shenzhen than in Chonqing,but personal identity characteristics,such as household registration and nationality,have less influence in Shenzhen than in Chongqing.The population′s industry and education compositions are the most important influencing factor of income distribution.Since employment industry and education level are closely related,improving financial input in education and balancing education resource distribution have important implications for preventing economic risk from income inequality in China.

This paper is concerned with inequality of income distribution and labour migration in China. Using data from 1% population sample survey of Chongqing City, this paper examines the socio-demographic characteristics of labour migration that have had impact on income generation and distribution. Results show that labour migration has considerably increased migrant income, and played a positive role in reducing income gap between urban and rural areas, regions and population groups. Labour migration that is stable and orderly is among important driving forces for sustained economic and social development.