城市群政策能否促进区域金融协调发展?——基于方言视角下的实证检验

基于中国区域金融高质量发展的现实要求,本文试图解释城市群政策对金融协调发展的影响,并深入探究其中的机制路径。研究发现,城市群政策有效提升了地区的金融发展质量,一方面提升了金融发展总量,另一方面弥合了地区间的金融发展差距,由此实现了总量和均衡的双重拟合。进一步地,本文确证了方言一致性在整体上有助于城市群政策发挥积极作用,不仅在城市群内部促进了金融协调发展,还在城市群分割处弱化了由城市群政策带来的市场分割效应,体现了非正式制度在"正式制度-金融要素"之间扮演的重要角色。从机制上看,与城市群密切相关的地方文化--方言,更多的是通过经济个体间的身份认同(信任)来促成地区间的金融协调发展。鉴于此,本文认为对城市群的划分和发展,不仅要考虑地理距离,还应考虑以方言为代表的文化距离,并提出了相应的政策建议。

Can Urban Agglomeration Policies Promote the Coordinated Development of Regional Finance？ A Perspective Based on Chinese Dialects

China's economy is transitioning from high-speed growth to high-quality development, and a key issue is how to best facilitate this transition. Optimizing spatial layout, agglomerating factors, and building advanced urban agglomerations can ensure high-quality development. Under the modern economic system, the operation of the financial system has clear regional characteristics, and the coordinated development of regional finance is critical to the optimal allocation of resources. Financial development theories increasingly emphasize the influence of formal and informal institutional factors, and provide a new perspective on the coordinated development of regional finance in relation to institutional arrangements and social capital allocation.
This paper uses data on the dialects, finances, economies, and urban agglomerations of 338 cities from 2001 to 2015 to examine the impact of formal institutions (urban agglomeration policies) and informal institutions (culture) on the coordinated development of regional finance. It finds that urban agglomeration policies effectively improve the quality of regional financial development. Such policies improve the overall level of financial development; they also bridge gaps in financial development among different regions and result in balanced development.
As formal and informal institutions evolve together, the formal institutions may change or disappear, but informal institutions (especially culture) may be more lasting. Therefore, this paper further explores the role of local culture (dialect) in the relationship between urban agglomeration policies and coordinated development of regional finance. In general, dialect consistency can assist urban agglomeration policies in coordinating regional financial development. More specifically, dialect consistency benefits financial development in two ways. Compared with cities that are not in urban agglomerations, cities in the same urban agglomeration with the same dialect have better coordinated financial development. In addition, dialect consistency can weaken the market segmentation effect of urban agglomeration policies at the boundaries of urban agglomerations. Thus, informal institutions play an important role in the relationship between formal institutions and financial development. The robustness of these findings is confirmed by multiple tests, including a placebo test, change of sample period, and substitution of independent or dependent variables.
In terms of mechanisms, this paper starts with the function of strengthening communication and enhancing mutual trust due to a common dialect, and deconstructs its mechanism. Due to the popularization of Mandarin, the communicative function of dialect has been somewhat weakened, but dialects still play a role in the relationship between urban agglomeration policies and the coordinated development of regional finance. Dialect consistency can reduce communication costs, improve trust, and promote the development of finance. This conclusion is also valid after considering consanguinity among individuals.
The contributions of this paper are as follows. First, it establishes a framework to analyze the impact of urban agglomeration policy on regional finance from the perspectives of overall financial development and regional disparity, avoiding the policy biases that may result from a single perspective. Second, as the role of informal institutions, especially regional culture, is unique and prolonged, and in some ways exceeds that of formal institutions, this paper investigates how dialects influence urban agglomeration policy and the coordinated development of regional finance.
Finally, this paper proposes the following policy suggestions. First, the creation of urban agglomerations and development policies should consider not only geographical distance but also cultural distance, as represented by dialects. The closer the culture is, the smaller the urban market segmentation. Dialect consistency strengthens the positive impact of urban agglomeration policies on the coordinated development of regional finance. Second, it is urgently necessary to establish a more sophisticated credit system. The results of this study show that dialect consistency enhances the impact of urban agglomeration policies on financial development through the mechanism of identity-based trust. The higher the credit level of a society, the better its economy.