A Bridge on Economic Issues between China and the World
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Unequal School Enrollment Rights and Increased Inequality: The Case of Shanghai
Muyang Zhang, Jie Chen, Jan 03, 2018In Shanghai, housing entitlements with enrollment access to a good public primary school is associated with a 0.1-0.35 percentage point lower annual rental yield. This rental yield gap is the opportunity cost of securing such housing, which is within the affordability range of most middle-income families in Shanghai. This implies that, should there be no credit constraint for homeownership, children from middle-income families should have a higher likelihood of accessing better public education. We find, however, that the enrollment rights between homeowners and renters, together with the credit constraint to own a home, actually lowers the chance of children from middle-income families of attending better public schools relative to those children from families with high initial wealth. This resulting reduced intergeneration mobility exacerbates the social inequality in China.
“Golden Ages”: A Tale of the Labor Markets in China and the United States
Hanming Fang, Xincheng Qiu, Dec 15, 2021We examine the Chinese growth experience in the last three decades through the lens of the labor market, focusing on evolving cross-sectional earnings distributions. We contrast the Chinese labor market with that of the United States and provide an interesting tale of the two labor markets over the last 30 years.
FinTech Adoption and Household Risk-Taking
Claire Yurong Hong, Xiaomeng Lu, Jun Pan, Dec 16, 2020China has experienced a rapid increase in FinTech penetration in the form of offline digital payments over the past decade. Using unique account-level data on consumption, investments, and FinTech usage from the Ant Group, we find that FinTech can lower investment barriers and help households move toward optimal risk-taking. Inferring individuals’ risk tolerance from their consumption volatility, we find that individuals who are more risk tolerant benefit more from FinTech advancement. Examining the enhancement...
Do Multinationals Transfer Culture? Evidence on Female Employment in China
Heiwai Tang, Yifan Zhang, Nov 10, 2021In our recent paper (Tang and Zhang 2021), we investigate the global diffusion of culture through multinationals. We study specifically how foreign affiliates serve as a vehicle to diffuse gender norms from their countries of origin to China. Based on Chinese manufacturing firm-level data, we find that foreign affiliates in China tend to employ proportionally more female workers than local Chinese firms within the same industry...
The Productivity Consequences of Pollution-Induced Migration in China
Gaurav Khanna, Wenquan Liang, Ahmed Mushfiq Mobarak, Ran Song, Apr 07, 2021Severe air pollution induces workers to move from productive to unproductive regions, reducing their contribution to the aggregate productivity in China. In this paper, we quantify the productivity and welfare consequences of this important new pattern of migration. We find that the productivity losses from pollution through the indirect migration channel are approximately as much as the direct health costs of pollution.
