Abstract: Starting with the farmers’ income and the income gap among the farmers, this paper analyzes their impact on the trust in The New Rural Insurance System. The findings show that the relationship between farmers’ income and the income gap and the trust level in the New Rural Insurance System presents the characteristics of multi-layer nesting. The rural households with higher-incomes in both the economically developed and underdeveloped towns show a lower level of institutional trust, that the rural households with lower-incomes in economically underdeveloped towns show a higher level of institutional trust, and that using relevant income to measure farmers’ income and the income gap between farmers can better reflect the impact of income on the institutional trust, which is in line with the actual situation. The relationship between the subjective expectation of farmers at different income levels on the regional economic development and the level of trust in the old-age insurance system presents some differences; the higher-income farmers will subjectively reduce the level of trust in the current old-age insurance system, while the lower-income farmers show a high degree of trust. There exist some differences between farmers’ subjectively perceived income gap and the actual income gap, and the“egalitarian tendency”will expand this difference, resulting in a too high level of trust evaluation. The survey results show that the “egalitarian tendency” of farmers living in poor towns is more serious, and they have a higher level of trust in the old-age insurance system.

Key words: income of farmers, income gap among farmers, the New Rural Insurance System