简介：This paper considers the position of the Chinese elite in both national and international contexts。 I show that the Chinese elite has converged with the global elite in terms of their incomes, and that many senior Chinese executives are at least as well paid as their counterparts in rich countries。 Their insertion into the global elite is further demonstrated by their increasing participation in the World Economic Forum。 But this international convergence has been mirrored by national divergence: economic inequality has risen within China, extending the distance between elites and the rest of the population。

I show that for top income groups, the relative cost of employing a median wage worker for their personal service has plummeted, increasing their entitlements over labor and thus their capacity to dominate their compatriots。 This has been accompanied by a dramatic rise in the reliance of the elite on domestic workers, a traditional symbol of social inequality。 Thus the convergence of Chinese elites with their international counterparts has gone hand in hand with both rising economic inequality and rising social inequality within China。

小雨简单说：随着中国精英与其他国家精英的日渐融合，他们与国内普通大众的距离却也越来越远。除了常见的不平等测量方式（社会层面的基尼系数和个体层面的收入或财富差距），作者关注高收入群体对他人劳力的控制（entitlements over labor, Segal 2021）。已知该收入群体平均可支配工资的数量和工人中位数工资，这个新测量方式告诉了我们来自某一收入群体的个人可以支配的平均工人人数以用于个人发展和消遣。根据这一新测量办法，作者先对巴西、美国、墨西哥、斯洛文尼亚和瑞士等国的情况进行了了解。例如作者发现，美国顶层1%大约平均可支配17个median-wage workers的劳动力（详情请见作者另一篇文章 Inequality as entitlements over labor）。对中国的数据进行分析后，作者发现中国的顶层1%平均可支配的median-wage worker的数量从1978年的6.1上升到了2014年的10.6，而顶层5%的支配力也由4.1上升到了7。具体数据来源和测量方式的信效度都还需仔细斟酌，不过从对私用劳动力的控制程度来考量不平等确实也符合进来社会分层研究对relational inequality的强调。（想写的东西又被别人先想到了，掀桌！）

From workers to capitalists in less than two generations: A study of Chinese urban top group transformation between 1988 and 2013

作者：Li Yang, Filip Novokmet, Branko Milanovic

简介：Economic and social transformation of China during the past 40 years is without precedent in human history. While the economic transformation was extensively studied, social transformation was not. In this paper, we use for the first time harmonized household surveys covering the period 1988–2013 to study the changes in the characteristics of the richest 5 percent of China's urban population. We find that it changed from being composed of high government officials, clerical staff, and workers in 1988 to professionals and small and large business owners in 2013. The educational level of the top group increased substantially. Membership in CCP has a positive (albeit small) effect on one's income but is particularly valuable to large business owners.

小雨简单说：顶层5%从政府官员、办事人员和工人让位给专业技术人员和企业主是并不令人惊讶的变化。对阶层构成和特征变化感兴趣的可以深入阅读。