A Bridge on Economic Issues between China and the World
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GDP Management to Meet or Beat Growth Targets
Changjiang Lyu, Kemin Wang, Frank Zhang, Xin Zhang, Oct 24, 2018We apply the discontinuity methodology from the accounting literature to a political economy setting of GDP reporting and examine whether Chinese local governments manage regional GDP numbers. We find strong evidence of discontinuities around zero in the distribution of actual minus target GDP growth rates. The frequencies of just meeting or beating GDP growth targets are about five (four) times the frequencies of just missing targets at the prefecture (province) level. The results are stronger for governors with longer tenures and those without political connections to higher-level officials as well as for local governments with more resources under their control.
Primary Care Chronic Disease Management in Rural China
Yiwei Chen, Hui Ding, Min Yu, Jieming Zhong, Ruying Hu, Xiangyu Chen, Chunmei Wang, Kaixu Xie, Karen Eggleston, Dec 11, 2019Health systems globally face increasing morbidity and mortality from chronic diseases, yet many — especially in low- and middle-income countries — lack strong primary care. Among recent contributions to understanding how economic incentives can be harnessed to address this challenge is a study in which we analyze China’s efforts to promote primary care management for rural residents with chronic disease...
Pushing on a String: State-Owned Enterprises and Monetary Policy Transmission in China
Peter Tillmann, Hongyi Chen, Apr 18, 2018In China, a large share of enterprises is state-owned and has preferential access to finances. This should affect the way the economy responds to changes in monetary policy. We find that a policy easing is more effective than a policy tightening – which is consistent with the PBC being able to “push on a string”.
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...
The COVID-19 Pandemic and Job Creation: The Role of Global Supply Chains
Hanming Fang, Chunmian Ge, Hanwei Huang, Hongbin Li, Dec 30, 2020Using big data of more than 100 million posted jobs from China, we estimate how the COVID-19 pandemic affected local labor demand in China via global supply chains. The data reveal that the number of newly posted jobs was about 31% lower in the first 14 weeks after the Wuhan lockdown than comparable periods in 2018 and 2019. We show that COVID-19 cases abroad and foreign governments’ pandemic-control policies reduced new job creation in China by 11.7%...
