Does union membership reduce gender earnings differentials? Evidence from employer–employee matched data in China

This paper examines whether union membership reduces gender earnings differentials in the Chinese labour market using an employer–employee matched data set. We have three main findings. First, union membership helps reduce the gender differentials in hourly wage and monthly allowance, but not in monthly basic wage and yearly bonus. Second, ensuring that female workers receive overtime pay is one way by which union membership helps reduce the gender earnings differentials. Third, controlling for firm fixed effects reduces the effect of union membership on the gender gap in hourly wage and monthly allowance, which means that the unobserved firm characteristics might impact the effect of union membership on gender earnings differentials.     

变化环境中的中国共产党调适性——海外中国研究的视角

在最近的十余年中,西方学界出现了对中国共产党调适性的研究,它以共产党国家体制持久性为研究问题,以中国共产党的能动行为为研究对象,探讨中国共产党在变化环境中的调适现象。文章认为,这一研究有着西方式的问题意识,对中国共产党在变化环境中的能动做出了多层面的分析,带动了以党为中心的研究范式的复兴。但是,这一研究仍受限于西方政治理论与政治文化场景的影响,有其内在的问题。     

What Can Students Gain from China's Higher Education?

China's higher education system has undergone a rapid expansion over the last two decades. By drawing on hand-collected data, we explore students' experiences in college and in the labor market post-graduation in the wake of this expansion. According to our data, the largest employer of college graduates in the labor market was the state sector, followed by the domestic private sector. To explain the returns to college education in China, we explore three mechanisms: human capital, social networks, and signaling. We find that human capital measures, apart from a student's college English test scores, cannot explain the college wage premium, whereas both social networks (for example, membership of the Communist Party) and signaling matter significantly. This seems to indicate that in China, connections are crucial for student success in the labor market, whereas the higher education system itself is more a system for selecting talented individuals than it is for educating them. Finally, students allocate their time accordingly, for example, by spending more time studying English in college than any other subject.     

Political connections, financing and firm performance: Evidence from Chinese private firms

This paper examines the role of affiliation with the ruling Communist Party in the operation of private enterprises in China. Using a nationwide survey of private firms, we find that the Party membership of private entrepreneurs has a positive effect on the performance of their firms when human capital and other relevant variables are controlled. We further find that Party membership helps private entrepreneurs to obtain loans from banks or other state institutions, and affords them more confidence in the legal system. Finally, we find Party membership to be more important to firm performance in regions with weaker market institutions and weaker legal protection.     

Has China crossed the river? The evolution of wage structure in urban China during reform and retrenchment

In this paper, we examine the determinants of urban wages in China from 1988 to 2002. We find increased returns to education but a decrease in the returns to experience. The 2002 data imply that the widening pure gender gap and the growth in the premium to Communist Party membership may have come to an end. The reform of the state-owned enterprise (SOE) sector and the shift in industrial structure out of heavy industry is shown to impact wages of workers within those sectors. We use recall panel data for 1998 to 2002 to provide fixed effects estimates of the impact of sector ownership, Communist Party membership and unemployment on wages. Journal of Comparative Economics 33 (4) (2005) 644–663.     

Do China's people favour redistribution? Evidence from an incentivized experiment

From 1949, China's leaders brought their country through three decades of income and wealth compression, which was followed by more than three decades of sharply rising inequality. What preferences do China's people hold regarding what price (if any) is worth paying for greater equality? We conduct a laboratory decision‐making experiment mimicking aspects of a macro‐political–economic environment, using Chinese undergraduate student subjects. We find that our subjects have qualitatively similar tastes for equality as their counterparts in parallel US and European experiments; for example, most are willing to sacrifice some payment for more equality of earnings among other participants, and their willingness to do this is stronger when inequalities originate randomly versus based on performance. Considering the cases permitting direct comparison between Chinese and US subjects’ choices, redistributive choices tend to be a bit higher in China if the participant pays no direct cost and a bit lower if he or she pays such a cost, but the two distributions of decisions differ significantly in under 14% of conditions. Survey data too suggests preferences for a more equal income distribution in China than in other East Asian countries, suggesting a possible impact of the Chinese Communist Party dominance in education and media.     

土地革命时期中国共产党的财政思想研究*

在中国共产党诞生百年之际，在中国社会经济转型升级的今天，在财政已经上升为国家治理基础和重要支柱的背景下，研究和总结中国共产党在土地革命战争时期的财政思想具有重要的现实指导意义。思想根源于现实也反映现实，土地革命时期特定的社会政治经济背景孕育了中国共产党早期的财政思想，具体包括财政收入、财政支出和财政管理三大方面。这三个方面的思想密切关联，初步形成了中国共产党新民主主义革命早期传统财政学的雏形，构成了新中国社会主义财政学的重要基础，对于我国当今财政工作和现代财政制度建设具有重要的现实指导意义。     

Does Communist party membership pay? Estimating the economic returns to party membership in the labor market in China

Many studies have found that Chinese Communist party membership brings economic benefits to party members, but some studies also argue that the premium associated with party membership is merely due to members’ higher levels of ability and advantageous family backgrounds. The lack of consensus on the economic returns of party membership implies that the role of party membership is not well understood. This study estimates the economic returns to Chinese Communist party membership using complementary approaches to address the endogeneity of party membership status: propensity score matching and instrumental variable. Although the magnitudes of these estimates vary across estimators, all the estimates show positive economic returns to party membership. This paper also examines possible mechanisms for how party membership may bring benefits to members and provides evidence that party membership may generate political capital, but not social capital in the labor market in China.     

论邓小平的执政思想

执政党如何使自己的决策和运行机制适应执政的特点，如何按照执政的要求建立领导体制和执政方式，以及如何提高执政党的执政能力，从而巩固党的执政地位。邓小平同志提出了执政党首先应该搞清楚的问题是“什么是社会主义，如何建设社会主义”和“执政党应该是一个什么样的党，怎样建设执政党”。不仅如此，执政党还要研究世情、国情和党情，还必须加强自身的建设，只有这样中国共产党才能立于不败之地。     

部分群体资格：以高校学生入党经历为例

任何非先赋的群体资格的获得,都需经过一个非群体资格一部分群体资格一完备群体资格的过程,即群体资格具有梯度特征,是一个连续统。部分群体资格在现实生活中广泛存在却为人们所忽视。本文以高校学生入党经历为例,探讨了部分群体资格的构造和获得过程。论文指出,部分群体资格的设置,既为个人提供了勘查和学习的机会,并激起更强烈的认同;也为群体提供了筛选成员的机会,并确立了群体权威和合法性。部分群体资格的获得,由内外群成员共同决定,但两者依据的标准不同。仪式在该过程中起到重要作用,而部分群体资格成员会运用策略进行积极的筹划和回应。论文在最后讨论了部分群体资格的理论内涵和现实意义。     

马克思主义的生态文明理论

马克思主义的经典作家在对资本主义批判的基础上,形成并阐述了一系列的生态文明思想。党的十七大报告旗帜鲜明地写入生态文明一词,马克思生态文明经典作家的思想生态文明发展成为中国化马克思主义的重要内容之一。综合梳理马克思主义生态文明理论,文章认为马克思主义生态文明理论主要体现在它的自然本源的生态世界观、以人为本的生态价值观、和谐发展的生态实践观三个维度上。     

中国共产党科技自立自强思想的百年演进

中国共产党科技自立自强思想经历了基础萌芽、起步探索、初步形成、丰富发展和成熟完善5个阶段。自中国共产党成立至新中国成立前，产生了关于科学技术重要作用的最初认识；新中国成立至改革开放前，党中央提出“自力更生，向科学进军”的科学技术发展方针；改革开放至20世纪90年代初期，党中央提出坚持以自力更生为主的高科技发展方针，努力接近与赶上世界科技发展先进水平。20世纪90年代初期到党的十八大前夕，党中央提出要提高自主创新能力，增强国家核心竞争力。党的十八大以来，中国共产党提出把科技自立自强作为国家发展战略支撑，坚定不移地走自主创新道路。中国共产党科技自立自强思想历经百年，不断深化。面对世界百年未有之大变局，科技自立自强思想明确了科学技术事业发展方向，为大力推进科技创新、建设创新型国家提供了理论指导，为把我国建设成为世界科技强国提供了行动指南。     

The role of social capital in the labour market in China1

Social capital is considered to play an economic role in labour markets. It may be particularly pertinent in one that is in transition from an administered to a market‐oriented system. One factor that may determine success in the underdeveloped Chinese labour market is thus guanxi, the Chinese variant of social capital. With individual‐level measures of social capital, we test for the role of guanxi using a dataset designed for this purpose, covering 7,500 urban workers and conducted in early 2000. The evidence is consistent with the basic hypothesis. Both measures of social capital – size of social network and Communist Party membership – have significant and substantial coefficients in the income functions. Social capital can have influence either in an administered system or in one subject to market forces. It appears to do so in both parts of the labour market.     

Former Communist party membership and bribery in the post-socialist countries

We study the effect of former Communist party membership on paying bribes to public officials and motivations for bribery, 25 years after the fall of communist rule. Data come from a large representative survey, conducted in post-socialist countries in 2015/16. To deal with endogeneity, we instrument party membership with information on whether family members were affected by the Second World War. Instrumental variable results suggest that links to the former Communist party increase the likelihood of paying bribes today; this result applies to the former party members as well as their children and relatives. Among bribe payers, people with the party links are more likely to offer bribes as well as think that bribe payments are expected. Overall, our findings suggest that the proclivity to corruption of the former Communist party members has been transmitted through family and thus sustained over time, contributing to corruption decades after the demise of the Socialist bloc.     

Who Secures Job Opportunities in the Chinese Government? Evidence Based on the First Jobs of Graduates from a Chinese College

Using a unique data set obtained from a Chinese college, the present paper investigates the determinants of obtaining a job in the Chinese Government. Despite the significant amount of attention paid to this issue by the media, academic study on this subject has been limited. We find that the parents' social capital, membership to the Communist Party, gender and personal ability significantly affect the possibility of a graduate obtaining a job in the public sector. Moreover, although acquiring a job in the government is difficult, no significant wage premium exists for graduates working in this sector. Finally, these results still hold after conducting the Heckman tests to validate the self‐selection bias. This study identifies the determinants of young Chinese people's aspirations to be civil servants, which raises significant policy implications for the government.     

我国促进社会创新的政策现状与问题分析

随着全球社会问题日益严峻,社会创新成为了解决社会问题的重要途径。以往针对社会创新的研究大多聚焦于微观层面,较少从宏观政策层面出发。本文首先界定了社会创新的概念,进而以十八大以来颁布的科技创新政策为分析对象,从创新主体激励、社会利益增进、创新机制变革三个层面梳理了我国在促进社会创新方面的政策现状,最后提出存在的问题及未来展望,旨在为科技部门及其他部门进一步制定和完善相关政策提供思路。     

蒋介石与《中国之命运》

本文对蒋介石与《中国之命运》问题作重新探讨。通过该书的起草者陶希圣档案文本、蒋介石日记以及相关的中共党史文献等,本着有一分史料说一分话的态度,尽可能客观地解读这段历史,并试图回答以下几个问题,一、蒋介石推出这本书的动机是什么？二、《中国之命运》被视为“反共宣战书”是如何提出的？为何说它是“反共宣战书”？三、围绕着《中国之命运》一书争论背后,国共两党领袖交锋的真正意图是什么？     

中国共产党推进经济与国防建设协调发展的经验及启示

军民融合是中国共产党长期探索国防与经济建设协调发展的重大创新,是实现发展与安全兼顾的重大决策,是加快推动社会主义现代化建设进程的重大举措,为实现富国强军提供了根本遵循。站在全面建成小康社会并乘势而上进军第二个百年奋斗目标的时间节点上，梳理100年来在中国共产党领导下军民关系从萌芽阶段上升为军民融合国家战略的5次历史性飞跃，将军民融合发展的成功经验总结为始终坚持先进科学理论的指导作用，始终坚持中国共产党的统领地位，始终坚持国防建设与社会经济协调发展，始终坚持发挥改革创新和与时俱进的精神特质。新发展格局下以新发展理念推动经济高质量发展，军民融合要以更深层次改革、更高水平科技创新为产业结构调整提供根本动力。     

GENDER EARNINGS DIFFERENCES IN CHINA: BASE PAY,PERFORMANCE PAY,AND TOTAL PAY

We utilize a data set that has not been used in literature—the Life Histories and Social Change in Contemporary China (LHSCCC)—to provide new evidence on male‐female pay differences in China. The data set not only enables us to control for a wide range of pay‐determining characteristics but also is the first to enable an analysis of the different components of pay (e.g., base pay and performance pay) as well as for total pay. We find: (1) Women receive about three‐quarters of male pay for each of the dimensions of base pay, performance pay, and total pay, before adjusting for the effect of different pay‐determining factors; (2) Approximately two‐thirds of the gap reflect the fact that females tend to be paid less than males for the same wage‐determining characteristics (often labeled as discrimination), while about one‐third reflects the fact that males have endowments or characteristics that tend to be associated with higher pay, especially supervisory responsibilities, general labor market experience, occupational skills, education, and membership in the Communist party; (3) Marriage has a large positive effect on the earnings of women in China (and none for men), but childcare responsibilities for children under the age of 6 have a large negative effect on the earnings of women although these are offset almost completely if an elder family member is present, highlighting that childcare responsibilities disproportionately fall on women unless an elder family member is present; (4) Pay premiums for higher level skills and higher supervisory ranks are remarkably small for both males and especially females; (5) With respect to the unexplained or “discriminatory” portion of the gap, females get a huge pay penalty for simply being female, but a substantial portion of this gets offset by the higher pay premium they receive for such factors as Han ethnicity, being married, and education. This suggests that discrimination tends to occur in the form of a pay penalty for simply being female and not from lower returns to the same endowments of pay‐determining characteristics. (JEL J3, J7, M5)     

以改善民生为重点 推动社会和谐发展

党的十七大提出加快推进以改善民生为重点的社会建设，是中国特色社会主义事业的重要组成部分。解决民生问题是中国特色社会主义本质特征的集中体现，是深入贯彻落实科学发展观的重要内容，是构建社会主义和谐社会的必然要求，也是全面建设小康社会的重要任务。解决民生问题要从人民群众最关心的问题出发，真正实践“权为民所用、情为民所系、利为民所谋”。