A Bridge on Economic Issues between China and the World
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Is the Wife A Risk Mitigator? Evidence from Family Firms in China
Yue Pan, Jinli Xiao, Vincent W. Yao, Jian Zhang, Jun 06, 2018Firm-level decisions are largely made by corporate executives whose preferences and attitudes can be shaped by historical traits and what is happening inside their households. We investigate how the involvement of a founder’s wife through marital ownership influences the family firm’s level of risk-taking and explore the underlying mechanisms.
The Role of Punctuation in the P2P Lending Market
Xiao Chen, Bihong Huang, Dezhu Ye, Apr 04, 2018Using data from Renrendai, one of the largest P2P lending platforms in China, we investigate how the amount of punctuation used in loan descriptions influences the funding probability, borrowing rate, and default. The empirical evidence shows that the amount of punctuation is negatively associated with the funding probability and borrowing rate. We propose that the usage of punctuation affects the readability of a loan description and reflects borrowers’ self-control and cognitive ability.
Housing Booms and Shirking
Quanlin Gu, Jia He, Wenlan Qian, Oct 03, 2018Our research studies the incentive costs of China’s housing booms . We use the type and actual time stamps of 9.3 million credit card transactions by over 200,000 cardholders to detect non-work-related behavior during work hours. Employees respond to positive house price shocks with an immediate and permanent increase in their propensity to use work hours to attend to personal needs. Our estimate implies an elasticity of shirking propensity with respect to house price of 1.6. The effect is driven by homeowners, especially among owners with higher housing wealth. Further analyses point to negative productivity implications of the increased shirking.
In the Shadows of the Government: Relationship-building during Political Turnovers
Hanming Fang, Zhe Li, Nianhang Xu, Hongjun Yan, Mar 06, 2019We document that firms use two instruments to build relationships with local government officials in China: “perk spending” and personnel changes. Following a turnover in the positions of Party Secretary or Mayor of a city in China, firms (especially private firms) headquartered in that city significantly increase their perk spending...
Spillovers in Childbearing Decisions and Fertility Transitions: Evidence from China
Pauline Rossi, Yun Xiao, Mar 24, 2021To what extent and through which mechanisms are couples influenced by others when choosing their own family size? Recent research exploits exemptions in China’s family planning policies to show that conformism and competition drove the diffusion of small families, and hence accelerated the fertility transition in China.
