Merger of Large and Small Cities and Economic Growth in Boundary Areas:Evaluation by Synthetic Control Based on Machine Learning Algorithms
The slow economic growth in areas located on administrative boundaries due to factors such as the division of administrative power and local protectionism is one of the major obstacles to achieving the great circulation of the national economy and the high-quality development of the regional economy.Adjusting administrative divisions makes it possible to accelerate the economic development of administrative boundary areas.At present,there have been many studies on changing counties into districts,the merger of two districts,and the establishment of development zones,but there has been a lack of detailed research on whether the adjustment of administrative divisions,especially the merger of small cities by large cities,can reduce the poverty of the boundary areas.Using the Laiwu merger into Jinan as a natural experiment,this study investigates the impact of the small cities merged into large cities on the economic growth in the original boundary area using fine-grained satellite lighting data and a synthetic control method based on machine learning.The results reveal that the merger of Jinan and Laiwu has had a positive impact on the economic growth of the boundary area—the actual value of the light brightness of the boundary area is on average 10.8％higher than the predicted counterfactual synthetic value.The conclusions remain robust after replacing the boundary area metric,changing the control group,and using the machine learning method.Further,the study examines the treatment heterogeneity effect on both sides of the boundary located in large and small cities.The results reveal that the positive effects of mergers are mainly on the boundary located in the core city of Jinan,while the boundary located in the small city of Laiwu benefits very little from mergers.The likely reason for this is the competition for economic growth between local governments in China,which relies on the tournament model of relative ordering at the regional level.Before the merger,the Jinan government lacked incentives to invest more resources in its boundary area near Laiwu,which led to a relatively low level of development in this area.Laiwu,with its small city size,tends to proactively approach Jinan to absorb the spillover effects of the economy from Jinan,which made boundary areas located in Laiwu more developed than expected.After the city merger,the administrative division effect is eliminated,and the Jinan boundary area has opportunities for rapid economic growth.Based on the results,this study puts forward three policy recommendations.First,as strengthening the merger between large and small cities helps to weaken the administrative barriers mentioned above,the central government should strengthen the coordination among local governments and encourage the governments of large and small cities to establish a coordination mechanism on their own initiative to promote the rational allocation of resources,thereby realizing the economic development of the areas along the administrative boundaries of cities.Second,the government should consider the level of economic growth and resource endowment of each city and formulate corresponding policies to promote coordinated regional development.Third,governments at the higher level must play a role in coordinating to encourage large cities to abandon the"beggar-thy-neighbor"mentality,open up the broken roads,deepen regional cooperation,and promote the synergistic development of the economies of cities of all sizes.
Administrative BoundariesSatellite Lighting DataSynthetic Control MethodMachine Learning
万方数据
维普
