Investigation into the Socioeconomic Determinants and Mitigation Strategies of the Regional Digital Divide in China
This article investigates the regional disparities in internet usage across regions and combines the dimen-sions of"penetration rate"and"basic resources."It examines the socioeconomic factors affecting 31 provinces,mu-nicipalities,and autonomous regions of Mainland China since the 21st century,employing a dynamic panel model and the System GMM approach.The analysis covers various fundamental socioeconomic factors such as economic growth,demographics,household income,infrastructure,government intervention,openness to foreign investment,technology,and the level of urbanization,while also assessing the relative importance and robustness of each factor's impact.Results indicate that factors such as household income and economic growth have a significant impact on the formation and evolution of the regional digital divide within the country at the current stage.Additionally,the study identifies the cyclical cumulative characteristics of the regional digital divide's evolution,the varying degrees of impact from different types of factors,and the significant variations in the influence of socioeconomic factors on internet de-velopment across different regions and stages of development.Finally,the paper proposes that the key to eradicating the regional digital divide lies in accelerating infrastructure development,protecting vulnerable groups,and deepe-ning internet governance.
regional digital dividesocioeconomic factorsdynamic panelSystem GMMpanel quantile regression
NETL
NSTL
万方数据
维普
