The Impact of Digital Divide on China's Household Income Gap
The large income distribution gap and uneven regional development are the main manifestations of China's uneven economic development.How to bridge the income distribution gap through high-quality development is an important task to achieve common prosperity.At the same time,with the development of the digital economy,the emergence of the digital divide may have adverse effects on income distribution.This article uses data from Chinese Household Finance Survey to con-struct a digital divide index using factor analysis from two dimensions:accessibility and usage,and studies their impact on in-come inequality.The results of empirical analysis show that the digital divide is an important factor affecting income distribu-tion,and the digital divide has significantly increased income inequality.While the digital divide index increases by 1 unit,the Gini coefficient of community income significantly increases by 0.0085.Compared to the access gap,the usage gap has a greater impact on income inequality.Mechanism analysis shows that the digital divide exacerbates income inequality by sup-pressing,to a greater extent,the entrepreneurship of low-income households and non-agricultural employment of rural house-holds.Further analysis has found that the digital divide has a stronger inhibitory effect on the income level of relatively vulner-able groups,such as households with lower education levels and limited social network.To alleviate income inequality,this article presents three suggestions:improve digital infrastructure and develop digital in-clusive finance to provide convenience for household entrepreneurship;enhance digital skills of rural residents and stimulate non-agricultural employment;carry out digital assistance actions to promote the sharing of digital development dividends among vulnerable groups.
Digital DivideIncome GapMatthew EffectCommon Prosperity
万方数据
维普
