A Bridge on Economic Issues between China and the World
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Industry/Policy View China’s High Savings: Drivers, Prospects, and Policies
Longmei Zhang, Ding Ding, Hui He, Rui C. Mano, Apr 17, 2019China’s high national savings rate—one of the highest in the world—is at the heart of its external/internal imbalances. High savings finance elevated investment when held domestically, and lead to external imbalances when they flow abroad. Today, China’s higher savings, compared to the global average, mostly emanate from the household sector, due to demographic...
What Is Special about China’s Housing Boom?
Edward L. Glaeser, Wei Huang, Yueran Ma, Andrei Shleifer, Jun 20, 2017The spectacular ongoing housing boom in China has generated great concerns around the world about the risk of a housing bust on the Chinese economy and the world economy. This column by four Harvard economists compares this housing boom with that experienced by the U.S. in 2000s and dissects its distinct characteristics — its fundamental support, enormous construction, and the delicate role played by government policies.
Privatization and Productivity in China
Yuyu Chen, Mitsuru Igami, Masayuki Sawada, Mo Xiao, Jan 31, 2018Privatization has boosted Chinese firms’ productivity, both in the short run and the long run. Consumer-oriented industries saw larger gains than “strategic” (heavily regulated) sectors. Chinese patents and “new product” surveys seem less reliable, because any statistics become useless once they become policy targets.
Book Synopsis The Making of an Economic Superpower: Unlocking China’s Secret of Rapid Industrialization
Yi Wen, Sep 27, 2017This book argues that China’s rapid industrialization since 1978 can be attributed to its rediscovery of the secret recipe of the original Industrial Revolution. The secret recipe is not based on institutional changes per se but rather the sequential creation of mass markets to support mass production. Market creation requires a strong state and appropriate industrial policies because mass markets are a public good that is extremely costly to create and can only be created through stages and under enormous political stability and social trust.
Exports in Disguise: Trade Rerouting during the US-China Trade War?
Ebehi Iyoha, Edmund Malesky, Jaya Wen, Sung-Ju Wu, Bo Feng, Jan 22, 2025We found that the level of rerouting varied significantly depending on the granularity of the measure used: 16.5% of Vietnamese exports to the US were rerouted at the product level, compared to just 1.7% at the firm level. Trade war tariffs led to increases in rerouting, but estimates were again significantly smaller for more granular measures, underscoring the importance of detailed microdata in formulating trade policy and measuring compliance.
