Off-shoring and labor productivity: Evidence from China

This paper uses input-output tables to measure material off-shoring, service off-shoring and narrow sense material off-shoring on 33 industries by use of DJ index (Daveri and Jona-Lasinio, 2008), not FH index with “the same proportion assumption” (Feenstra and Hanson, 1996). It estimates the effects of the off-shoring on labor productivity by panel data model. Our results show that, the off-shoring is generally positively associated with labor productivity, and service off-shoring has more significant effect than the material off-shoring. There are some key aspects to be discussed in detail, including: (1) the heavy industry’s material off-shoring increases obviously and service off-shoring declines in recent years, and the former’s contribution to productivity growth is less than the latter; (2) the demand of chemical industry for service off-shoring significantly increases and its positive marginal effect on productivity growth is stronger than the material because of industry transformation and upgrading; and (3) the current intensive material off-shoring of textile, equipment manufacturing industries greatly contributes to productivity growth, while the positive effect from service off-shoring on labor productivity has initially boomed. In conclusion, we provide some suggestions for further development of China’s off-shoring.     

Fertility and maternal labor supply: Evidence from the new two-child policies in urban China

The One-Child Policy which had been implemented for over 30 years in China was formally relaxed in 2010s. The New Two-Child Policies gradually allowed all couples to have two children. This paper investigates the impact of the New Two-Child Policies on individual behavior related to birth and maternal labor supply. We find number of children significantly increased after the implementation of the New Two-Child Policies. Using the New Two-Child Policies as an exogenous variation in fertility, we find negative effect of number of children on maternal labor supply in both extensive and intensive margin. Our results have important implications for the further relaxation of birth-control policies.     

Political hierarchy and urban primacy: Evidence from China

This paper studies the distributional effects of a centralisation reform of China’s political hierarchy on regional urbanisation. Initiated in 1983, the reform, implemented over a 20-year period, transferred the decision-making powers of county-level governments to prefecture-level governments. We use a difference-in-differences approach to evaluate the heterogeneous urbanisation of counties in response to this centralisation reform. The distributional effects include greater urban primacy and a more marked core–periphery structure at the prefecture level. Further analyses reveal that the results are driven by the reallocation of fiscal resources and industrial production based on both productivity advantages and political favouritism.     

金融发展和经济增长: 来自中国的实证检验

利用时间序列框架内的格兰杰因果分析、协整技术和向量误差修正模型,本文评价1978-2005年间金融发展与经济增长间的数量联系.实证分析发现,控制政府支出和贸易开放度后,金融体系资金运用和金融深度都是经济增长的格兰杰原因,且都与经济增长正相关.而且,基于自回归分布滞后边界检验和向量误差修正模型,本文也实证检验中国股票市场发展与经济增长关系:分别控制政府支出和贸易开放度后,金融市场总融资额是经济增长的原因,而经济增长是股票市场周转率的格兰杰原因.文章最后给出实证结论和简短的政策建议.     

Public pension and household saving: Evidence from urban China

We relate household savings to pension reform, to explain the high household savings rates in urban China from a new perspective. We use the exogenous – policy-induced – variation in pension wealth to estimate explicitly the impact of pension wealth on household savings, and obtain evidence of a significant offset effect of pension wealth on household savings. Although the size of the effect depends on the parameter values assumed, the finding that household savings are affected by pension reform is robust. Our estimates show that, under plausible scenarios, pension reform boosted household savings rates in 1999 by about 6–9 percentage points for cohorts aged 25–29 and by about 2–3 percentage points for cohorts aged 50–59. Our results also indicate that declining pension wealth reduces expenditure on education and health more than on other consumption items.     

Fertility,household structure,and parental labor supply: Evidence from China

This study examines the effects of fertility on household structure and parental labor supply in China. To solve the endogeneity problem, we use a unique survey on households with twin children and a comparison group of non-twin households. The ordinary least squares estimates show a negative correlation between fertility and parental labor supply in rural China. Using twinning as a natural experiment, we do not find evidence on the negative effects of fertility on parental labor supply. By contrast, we find that the twinning-induced increase in fertility significantly enhances the coresidence of grandparents in rural China. We suggest that the negative effects of fertility on parental labor supply are mitigated by the childcare provided by grandparents in rural China. We also find that fertility does not induce coresidence of grandparents in urban China. Our results have important implications for population and public childcare policies.     

Economic policy uncertainty and mergers and acquisitions: Evidence from China

This study examines the relationship between economic policy uncertainty and mergers and acquisitions (M&As) in China. Using all listed Chinese companies on the Shanghai and Shenzhen Stock Exchanges as well as 4188 ​M&A deals from the period of 2001–2018, we show that Chinese firms are more likely to make acquisitions during periods of high economic policy uncertainty, which contradicts the behavior of US firms. We further show that state-owned enterprises (SOEs) are less likely than non-SOEs to make acquisitions during periods of high economic policy uncertainty. SOEs are less likely to use only cash for their acquisitions during periods of high economic policy uncertainty. These results indicate the prudence of SOEs regarding acquisitions relative to non-SOEs during periods of high economic policy uncertainty. Moreover, acquisitions during periods of high economic policy uncertainty are associated with an increase in shareholder wealth for acquirers, and this wealth effect is more pronounced for SOEs.     

Effect of goods market segmentation on labor mobility: Evidence from China

This study empirically investigates the effects of goods market segmentation on interregional labor mobility using data from National Population Surveys in China. The findings reveal that a one-standard deviation increase in the goods market segmentation index reduces interprovincial migration by 4.0%. Restraining interregional trade and improving industrial specialization are the two mechanisms at work. Further analysis indicates that the restrictive effect of goods market segmentation is greater on highly educated laborers and the labor flows from poorer to richer regions. The heterogeneous analysis also implies that migrants are more concerned about educational resources and consumption diversity.     

对外贸易、金融改革和经济增长:来自中国的证据

本文根据技术扩散模型阐释,中国的技术进步取决于它对先进技术的吸收能力和可吸收的世界先进技术集合的乘积。金融改革通过消除经济扭曲提升我国的吸收能力。如果国际先进技术通过对外贸易扩散到中国,那么对外贸易和金融改革在增长中就存在相互促进的作用。利用中国改革开放后的数据,我们没有发现对外贸易(出口或进出口)和金融改革在促进经济增长中有显著的互补作用。该结论在控制条件收敛、其他经济增长因素、分省和时间效应后成立,并在解决贸易的内生性后仍然稳健。将该结论和我们已发现的金融改革和外商直接投资在促进经济增长中有显著的互补作用的结果相对照,可见,与国际贸易相比,国际先进技术更可能通过外商直接投资扩散到中国。     

Economic transition and gender differentials in wages and productivity: Evidence from Chinese manufacturing enterprises

We use firm-level data to analyze male–female wage differences in Chinese industry in the late 1990s. Our estimates indicate that employers' discrimination against women was not a significant source of the gender wage gap in Chinese state-owned enterprises. Instead, we find that the relative wage of unskilled female to male workers was higher than their relative productivity. This result indicates that unskilled female workers in the state sector had historically received wage premiums and consequently accounted for a disproportionate share of the sector's labor surplus.     

Regional Economic Disparity,Financial Disparity,and National Economic Growth: Evidence from China

The dynamic relations among national economic growth, economic disparity, and financial disparity in China are examined. Specifically, the focus is on whether economic disparity or financial disparity affects national economic growth. As measures of economic and financial disparity across regions and provinces, the Williamson coefficient of disparity is employed using both regional data (eastern, central, and western) and provincial data (from 31 provinces). Overall, it is found that both provincial financial disparity and, to a lesser degree, economic disparity have a negative effect on national economic growth. In addition, financial disparity appears to be exogenous, suggesting that financial disparity is not influenced by either economic disparity or national economic growth.     

族群多样性与地方经济增长—来自中国城市层面的证据

族群多样性的经济影响及其发生机制,是经济学中一个方兴未艾的前沿研究领域.文章利用全国人口普查数据和抽样调查资料,构建了中国300多个城市族群多样性的面板数据,通过计量分析发现,高的族群多样性显著降低了地方经济增长率.在考察了测量指标的影响和内生性问题后,结论依然稳健.通过对影响机制的探讨,文章发现:高的族群多样性显著增大了语言沟通成本,降低了私有部门投资率;另一方面,公有部门投资率不受族群多样性的影响,人均中央财政转移支付和族群多样性显著正相关,这两者缓解了族群多样性的不利影响.以上发现,一方面为族群多样性经济影响的研究提供了新的实证证据;另一方面也为中国地方经济增长的差异性提供了一个新的解释,并衍生出新的学术课题和政策意涵.     

地区放权与经济效率:以计划单列为例

中国的经济改革始于放权,尤其是对地区的放权。本文以计划单列为例,研究整体性行政放权对经济效率的影响并通过构造省内与省外城市的对比组来估计计划单列的因果效应。研究结果表明:从总体上,放权确实有助于计划单列市提高其经济效率。本文对此结论进行了一系列的稳健性检验。     

经济政策不确定性与创新——基于我国上市公司的实证分析

本文阐明了一个经济政策不确定性如何影响企业创新的理论机制,提出经济政策不确定性会对企业创新产生激励效应和选择效应。在此基础上,本文利用Baker et al.(2016)构建的中国经济政策不确定性指数和我国上市公司的创新数据来进行实证研究。结果表明,与经济政策不确定性抑制企业投资活动的已有结论不同,经济政策不确定性正向影响上市公司R&D投入和专利申请量。此外,这一经济政策不确定性与创新活动的关系受政府补贴、金融约束、企业所有权性质、行业特征等因素影响。这些发现与经济政策不确定性对企业创新产生的选择效应和激励效应相吻合。     

Lineage networks,urban migration and income inequality: Evidence from rural China

This work focuses on the role that Chinese lineage networks can play in alleviating income inequality in rural villages through their effect on migration from rural to urban areas. Unique panel data from rural China identifies lineage networks (ancestral hall and genealogy) and provides detailed information on income and migration experiences. Our key finding is that lineage networks increase migration for all social groups by lowering costs, and this pattern is more salient for the poor. Consequently, this population accumulates greater wealth, which decreases income inequality in origin villages. The estimation results remain robust to both the inclusion of exogenous subsamples and an instrumental variables strategy using the effect of historical natural disasters on current lineage ancestral hall or genealogy. The analysis in this paper, coupled with an emerging empirical literature on networks and migration, provides a new perspective on how income inequality in a fast-growing economy varies with access to social networks.     

会计准则国际化的经济后果——来自新《企业会计准则》颁布目市场反应的初步证据

我们以2006年2月15日财政部颁布《企业会计准则》为契机,初步研究会计准则国际化的经济后果。具体的,我们考察新准则颁布事件窗具有不同会计职业判断空间的上市公司的市场反应,结果发现会计职业判断空间与其市场反应显著负相关。进一步的研究发现,具有更多会计职业判断空间的上市公司更可能从审计质量较高的事务所更换为审计质量较低的事务所,以更便利的实现新准则赋予的盈余管理,而且更多会计职业判断空间的上市公司,其股价同步性在准则颁布之后相比之前显著上升。     

Sample attrition and labor force dynamics: Evidence from the Spanish labor force survey

In this paper we examine a number of issues that arise in investigating labor force dynamics using the Spanish Labor Force Survey (EPA). These issues are by no means specific to the Spanish case and apply to most European-style labor force surveys. Our main conclusions may be summarized as follows. First, survey nonresponse cannot be neglected. Second, the EPA tends to underestimate employment and participation of high-educated young people, and to overestimate those of the low-educated elderly. Finally, we find little evidence that attrition causes important selection biases in estimating quarterly transition probabilities.     

Child labor and the minimum wage: Evidence from India

This study examines how changes in the minimum wage affect child labor in India. The analysis uses repeated cross sections of India's NSSO employment data from 1983 to 2008 merged with data on state-level minimum wage rates. Theoretically, the impact of the minimum wage on child work could go either way, so empirical evidence from a country with high rates of child labor and a myriad of minimum wage laws across states and industries helps to lessen the ambiguity. Results indicate that regardless of gender, in urban areas, a higher minimum wage reduces child labor in household work. In rural areas a similar result applies for girls while household labor does rise for boys. The minimum wage has virtually no impact on child work outside of the home across urban and rural areas.     

Energy Consumption,Economic Development and Temperature in China： Evidence from PSTR Model

Since the 1980s, the Chinese economy has developed rapidly, with an av- erage annual growth rate around 10%. Energy consumption in China has greatly in- creased as well. This paper investigates the relationship between energy consumption, economic development and temperature in China by adopting provincial panel data from 1990 to 2011. Different from existing studies, in this paper, we use a panel smooth transition regression （PSTR） model to estimate the non-linearity relationship. Four different threshold variables including two lagged endogenous variables and two important exogenous variables have been considered. We find that energy intensity and the ratio of gross capital formation are suitable for the non-linearity model. The estimated elasticities of time dynamic indicate that energy consumption is income in- elastic and temperature inelastic. Elasticities of real income at first increase and then decrease, however, elasticities of temperature gradually increase after the year 1993. Last of all, we propose some policy implications.     

经济政策不确定性、资产可逆性与固定资产投资

本文利用2012年139部门国民经济投入产出表测算行业资产可逆性,并依据证监会行业分类匹配至非金融类A股上市公司,进而考察资产可逆性如何影响经济政策不确定性与固定资产投资的关系。考虑到资产可逆性与项目投资失败时的清算价值正相关,本文从经济政策不确定性上升会增加项目投资收益率波动的视角构建理论分析框架,并利用2007—2017年季度数据对理论假说进行实证检验。结果表明,随着所处行业的资产可逆性提升,经济政策不确定性对企业固定资产投资的抑制作用被弱化,且该效应在融资约束严重的企业更为凸显。特别地,在控制经济周期特征、投资机会和抵押担保效应后,上述研究结论依旧成立。此外,考虑到模型内生性、经济政策不确定性和资产可逆性的度量方式、行业匹配度及模型设定形式等问题,系列稳健性测试均证实资产可逆性这一传导渠道的重要性。本文结论表明,资产处置成本是企业投资决策的重要决定因素。