Job-housing balance and commuting changes under economic restructuring: The case of Hong Kong from 1992 to 2002

This paper uses travel survey data to analyze job-housing balance (JHB) and commuting changes in Hong Kong during the ten-year period of economic restructuring from 1992 to 2002. So far, most JHB studies were conducted at an aggregate level and, hence, failed to recognize that the spatial patterns of jobs for different economic sectors could differ substantially and have significant implications on the commuting patterns of workers in an economy undergoing economic restructuring. In this paper, four major economic sectors of the local economy - community services, financial and business, wholesales and trading, and manufacturing - Are selected for detailed analysis. It is hypothesized that different economic sectors would have different job-housing ratios (JHRs) and commuting patterns. The results show that people working in the manufacturing and financial and business sectors commuted much longer than those working in community services. Moreover, though people may not choose to work close to home, there was a negative relationship between JHRs and commuting distance for all economic sectors. If the JHB concept is applied to promote shorter commuting, the findings of this paper suggest that the policies should focus on community services first. Copyright © 2008 HKSTS.