Does Institutional Social Insurance Cause the Abandonment of Cultivated Land? Evidence from Rural China

At present, the world’s countryside needs to be revitalized urgently, and cultivated land is the critical factor in promoting the countryside’s revitalization. The reduction of uncultivated land contributes to the efficient use of rural land resources, contributing to global rural revitalization. This study uses data from 3938 Chinese peasant households conducted in 2014 and the OLS method to investigate the quantitative impact of institutional social insurance on cultivated land abandonment. The empirical results point to the following conclusions: (1) Institutional social insurance will weaken the social insurance function of land, which will lead to the generation of peasant households’ cultivated land abandonment. More specifically, for every 1% increase in the level of institutional social insurance of peasant households, the area of cultivated land abandoned increased by 0.002 mu; (2) The influence of institutional social insurance on peasant households’ cultivated land abandonment is heterogeneous, that is, endowment insurance can weaken the social insurance function of land more than medical insurance, and households with a higher proportion of pensioners are more likely to abandon cultivated land. This study’s conclusions may help understand the relationship between institutional and non-institutional social insurance and provide a reference for the effective use of cultivated land resources in the global rural revitalization.