I agree with you that the system is not as pervasive as it used to be, and I hope more reforms are coming, but given that current hukou system affects ¾ of china’s population, which is still rural, and is largely responsible for the current income inequality in Chinese society, which even the Chinese leadership agrees is one the most serious threats to the regime, I would say it qualifies for top ten bad laws.

People with rural hukou status can come to the cities to work, but the hukou system still has a huge impact on their lives, and the impact increases as income levels decrease. I haven’t heard of any city virtually abandoning the hukou system, but would be interested to hear of any examples. Many cities, especially second tier cities, have been relaxing restrictions to acquiring a local hukou as a way to attract educated and wealthy talent, but that serves more to exacerbate the level of social inequality more than anything. For the vast majority of Chinese citizens, you would have to spend multiple times your annual income, or be college educated, to be counted as a local resident of a major city.

Fei Ling Wang wrote an interesting book called Organization through Division and Exclusion,” (Stanford University Press, 2005). While it’s 3 years old, many of his points are valid. The preface is on google books. Some of his points – if you don’t have a local hukou you can’t vote, your children can’t receive the same state subsidized education. You have to score higher on the college entrance exams than urban hukou holders. You don’t receive subsidized medical care, job training, etc. You’re not even counted among the unemployed if you’re jobless, and aren’t eligible for relief and assistance. Moreover, most governments consider seasonal or temporary migrant residents a problem for their home area, and their treatment from government agencies are notoriously poor. Aaron Hegula has an article “Getting Paid” in the Berkeley Journal of International Law about this problem that has some pretty interesting anecdotal examples.

This area of the law is moving in the right direction. No need to put something like that on the list of “worst laws.”

not sure what you mean by this. Are you saying it isn’t a law or that it no longer has any impact? I would say your right on the first point (the hukou system is a collection of regulations that vary by location as opposed to a single law), but it clearly has a strong impact on migrant labor.

Migrants in cities have to pay more for education, have no access to urban social welfare programs, and while recent regualtions limit the fees associated with moving to cities, the whole registration process is still ripe with abuse. Just a few months ago a worker in Zhejiang was beaten by security guards while trying to get a temporary residence permit, causing a riot of a few hundred workers.