When studying job mobility, economists and sociologists have different focuses: The former tend to emphasize “pure rationality” and “maximized profit” as the driving forces; whereas the latter usually focus on the societal and non-economic factors. Further differences are seen in their discussion of the paths of job mobility: In addition to the formal paths based on the “human (intellectual) capital” illustrated by economists, sociologists emphasize the informal or relational paths based on the “social capital.” This paper presents the results of an empirical analysis of the job mobility paths in the Chinese urban labor market in transition. Workers with low levels of education tend to rely upon their “social capital” when they have to change jobs. In contrast, those with higher education tend to obtain job mobility via formal paths, reflecting the value of their “human capital”, which is an indicator of a highly effective labor market.
