查看更多>>摘要:Over time, China upgraded its capabilities to such an extent that it requires less imported materials, components, and services to maintain its central role in the global production network. Consequently, the domestic value added content of its exports has increased over time. Still, value added includes profits, which are partly earned by foreign capital owners, many of whom have set up operations in export processing zones. Such profits can be repatriated, and do not directly enhance the living standards in China. This paper will focus on the extent to which China's exporting activities have contributed to its Gross National Income (GNI), which is a better indicator of economy-wide living standards than GDP. Our results, based on input-output analysis, show that the increase in the share of Chinese GNI of a yuan of Chinese exports from 2002 to 2007 was modest, despite a marked growth of Chinese GDP contained in such a yuan of exports. From 2007 to 2017, however, the continued increase of domestic value added per yuan of exports did actually translate into considerably higher contributions of exports to GNI. Decomposition analyses show that changes in the commodity composition of China's export bundle and changes in the shares of national income in value added were the main cause of the different patterns before and after the financial crisis.
查看更多>>摘要:This study investigates the distortion of government disclosure on air pollution and further explores underlying political incentives that drive such distortion. We introduce a newly developed method, that is, bunching estimation based on notch points, to identify the distortion in the air pollution index disclosed by local governments. Results show that the magnitudes of distortion are significant and vary across cities. We present evidence that local politicians' promotion incentives substantially drive the distortion of environmental information. Importantly, we find that high-frequency disclosure requirements effectively discipline the behaviors of local governments because of increased manipulation costs. Overall, we contribute to the literature by identifying the distortion of government information disclosure, investigating the underlying causes, and examining the validity of new disclosure policies in shaping government behaviors.
查看更多>>摘要:Based on a nationwide representative county-level dataset from China, this article empirically examines the spillover effects of air pollution from neighboring coal-fired power plants on local mortality rates due to cardiovascular and respiratory diseases. We combine data on power plants' industrial output with information on wind direction and speed to proxy for air pollution, and find that air pollution from neighboring power plants indeed has significant negative effects on local public health. The resulting treatment costs are also enormous. Our findings shed light on the necessity of intergovernmental cooperation in environmental governance.
查看更多>>摘要:There are controversies on the trade promoting effect of the railroad in modern times in the existing literature. We estimate the impact of the railway on domestic trade through forward linkages using an Eaton-Kortum model with county-commodity level data in Shandong and Hunan provinces in 1933. We show that the railway significantly decreased the trade cost and improved bilateral trade in Hunan and Shandong provinces. In particular, for every 10% decrease in geographical distance, the value of bilateral trade increased by 8.98%. In addition, our results on the existence of provincial border effect in Hunan and the disappearance of it in Shandong, imply that the emergence of railway contributed to the removal of provincial border effect. Furthermore, we find that counties with railway connections had higher per capita output, especially for those with a larger manufacturing sector. Our results echo those found in Andrabi and Kuehlwein (2010) and Donaldson (2018) for British India and Pe acute accent rez-Cervantes (2014) for the US.
查看更多>>摘要:This study evaluates the long-run effects of early-life exposure to tropical cyclones on the socioeconomic performance of individuals in China. We identify significantly negative effects of gestational typhoon exposure on the educational attainment and annual income in adulthood, which also exhibit a significant gender inequality favoring the male. Despite the small culling effects from pregnancy failure and infant mortality, gestational typhoon exposures increase the probability of having a younger sibling and shorten the subsequent birth interval. Typhoon damage to the health and economic abilities of adults, as well as the local economy indicates a channel of household economic status for the reduced long-run socioeconomic outcomes.
查看更多>>摘要:As China aimed to transform her growth into an innovation-driven model, we study the impact of China's effort to promote technology inventions. By linking to Google Patents, we compile a comprehensive set of patent quality indicators. Based on Chinese provincial panel data from 1995 to 2010, we find that the effect of the implemented patent subsidy policies on quantity, as well as various quality metrics of patents, was significantly positive. Moreover, the explanation power of subsidy policies on both patent quantity and quality diminished as time goes by. We also find that the effect of these policies depended on the growth rate of experienced innovators rather than entrants. Since the implemented policies we study in this paper were designed to focus on subsidizing expenses incurred during the patenting process, our results show that the provided partial funding led the way for improving China's patent quality.
查看更多>>摘要:This study constructs a Ramsey-Cass-Koopmans growth model of the agricultural sector, which includes land transfer characteristics, to investigate the theoretical basis of the land transfer impact on multi-dimensional poverty, under a steady equilibrium. Using 2010, 2012, and 2014 panel data from the Mutual Aid Fund for Poverty-Stricken Villages in China, we obtained results indicating the impact of land transfer on multi-dimensional poverty, based on the generalized propensity score method. The research results are as follows: (1) The intensity of rural households' land transfer in poverty-stricken villages remains low, at only 14.54%; however, it demonstrates an increasing trend. (2) When the intensity of land transfer is continuously enhanced, the multidimensional poverty of rural households in poverty-stricken villages decreases. (3) Rural households' land transfer in poverty-stricken villages can reduce multi-dimensional poverty by improving their savings behavior. "Precautionary savings motivation" is an important land transfer mechanism affecting rural households' multi-dimensional poverty in poverty-stricken villages.
查看更多>>摘要:In "The Industrial Structure of Production: An Outline of a Research Program," Ronald Coase and Ning Wang (2001) made a plea for a new economic research program that can go beyond the ArrowDebreu framework and explain China's miraculous rise. They point out that the greatest trouble with the Arrow-Debreu framework lies in its inability to explain production. In this article I will push this insight further to shed new light on why and how production, or mass production in particular, emerged and mushroomed in the 18th-19th century England, the 19th-20th century United States, and 20th-21st century China but not in other parts of the world with similar geodevelopmental conditions such as the Netherlands, Mexico, or India. My central thesis is that production or firms emerge in response to market demand, yet the so-called "market" is itself a fundamental public good that must be created by a development state instead of the "invisible hand." Therefore, the lack of industrialization in any nation seems on the surface due to the lack of mass supply, but is in fact due to the lack of a mass market, which in turn is due to the lack of powerful and strong-willed market creators.
查看更多>>摘要:Research on the stimulants for Chinese Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) is extensive. However most analysis incorporates theoretical models based on the Institution-Based View or, to a lesser extent, the Resource-Based View (RBV). These highlight the importance of the macro (country) and micro (firm) level, while largely ignoring the meso (industry) level. In addition, although investments are known to have several different motivations, stimulated by quite different factors, analysis tends to focus on aggregate FDI flows. We contribute to the literature by proposing an 'industry-based view' of FDI which takes account of heterogeneity across industries and FDI motivation. We apply this framework to Chinese OFDI in Europe, differentiating both in terms of investment motivations and sectoral characteristics at (meso) industry level and at (micro) firm level, in home and host countries. Using logistic and multinomial logistic models, our analysis confirms that different types of Chinese FDI (in terms of motivation) are stimulated by different industry-level characteristics in both home and host countries.
查看更多>>摘要:This paper investigates the effect of the cancellation of China's program of "national poverty counties"-a place-based policy-on county-level fiscal expenditures. Our difference-indifferences results indicate that the cancellation reduces the county fiscal expenditure-to-GDP ratio by an average of 3.78%. To support a causal interpretation of these findings, we provide two plausible explanations, the reverse flypaper effect and the active/passive waste effect. Our findings survive the consideration of selection bias, omitted-variable bias, and spatial correlation. Policy implications of our findings are also discussed.