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Industry/Policy View Taxation Trends and Challenges in a Digital Economy — Implications for the People’s Republic of China

Akiko Terada-Hagiwara, Sep 11, 2019

The digital economy is growing rapidly across the globe and, among developing countries, the PRC is a leader. Despite its promise, the global digital economy also poses many challenges, including tax base erosion and profit shifting. Given the initial efforts by the PRC to address these challenges, this post recommends that the country continues...

Lessons from the Baby Bonus in South Korea: Increased Births and Restored Natural Sex Ratio

Wookun Kim, Jan 20, 2021

I study the causal effects of South Korea’s baby bonus on fertility by exploiting temporal and spatial variation in pro-natalist cash transfers provided to families with newborn babies. Based on registry records spanning the universe of births from 2000 to 2015, I find that the baby bonus increased completed fertility: in the absence of the policy, the total fertility rate in 2015 would have been lower by 3%, which is equivalent to 450,000 fewer babies born...

A New Perspective on China’s Credit Boom

Kinda Hachem, Michael Zheng Song, Jun 20, 2017

What caused the enormous credit boom in China? This column by Kinda Hachem and Michael Song offers an unexpected explanation of stricter liquidity regulations on banks leading to a credit boom through competition between small and big banks and their heavy use of shadow banking investment instruments.

Trade Liberalization and the Performance of China’s Manufacturing Sector

Loren Brandt, Johannes Van Biesebroeck, Luhang Wang, Yifan Zhang, Dec 27, 2017

China’s entry into WTO resulted in a significant reduction in tariffs on imported manufactured goods into China. We examine the effects of market liberalization on firm and industry performance. Tariff cuts on outputs and intermediates had highly complementary effects on productivity, and explain in upwards of forty per cent of the productivity gains between 1998-2007. The effects on mark-ups were largely offsetting, however lower tariffs on inputs helped to provide additional resources for productivity-enhancing investments.

Black Markets for License Plates in Chinese Megacities

Oystein Daljord, Mandy Hu, Guillaume Pouliot, Junji Xiao, Jan 29, 2020

Chinese megacities ration new car sales by capping the number of license plates they issue that permit driving within city limits. Concerns regarding the fairness of this policy have led city governments to use lotteries to allocate either all or a share of the license plates. Lotteries create gains from trade that have stimulated black markets for license plates in such cities...