A Bridge on Economic Issues between China and the World
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Environmentally Inclined Politicians and Local Environmental Performance:Evidence from Publicly Listed Firms in China
Hanming Fang, Honglin Ren, Danwen Song, Nianhang Xu, May 31, 2023We investigate whether and how environmentally inclined politicians (EIPs), i.e., politicians with prior environment-related work experience, affect local environmental performance in China.
BigTech Credit and Monetary Policy Transmission
Yiping Huang, Xiang Li, Han Qiu, Changhua Yu, Dec 07, 2022By comparing business loans made by a BigTech bank with those made by traditional banks, this study finds that BigTech loans tend to be smaller, and the BigTech lender is more likely to grant credit to new borrowers than conventional banks in response to expansionary monetary policy.
Pricing the Priceless: The Financing Cost of Biodiversity Conservation
Fukang Chen, Minhao Chen, Lin William Cong, Haoyu Gao, Jacopo Ponticelli, Feb 26, 2025This study investigates the pricing of financial risks associated with biodiversity conservation, with a particular focus on the Green Shield Action, a major regulatory initiative launched in China in 2017 to enforce biodiversity preservation rules in national nature reserves. While the initiative improved biodiversity, it also significantly increased bond yields for municipalities that are home to these reserves, effectively raising the general cost of public capital. These effects were primarily driven by heightened default risks plausibly caused by transition costs from shutting down illegal economic activities within the reserves and additional public spending on biodiversity conservation, even when local governments raise the same amount of money. Furthermore, the study reveals that the biological benefits of these conservation policies were not adequately recognized or impounded into the prices by the capital markets.
Government-Directed Urban Growth, Firm Entry, and Industrial Land Prices in Chinese Cities
Jan K. Brueckner, Wenhua Liu, Wei Xiao, Junfu Zhang, May 17, 2023We examine the effect of large-scale administrative reorganization in China, where counties are annexed into cities to accommodate urban growth.
Digital Dividends? Rural E-Commerce and the Urban-Rural Income Gap
Lei Wang, Yongming Sun, Oct 15, 2025We examine the impact of China’s Rural E-Commerce Comprehensive Demonstration (RECD) project on the urban-rural income gap. Using county-level data from 2006 to 2022 and a time-varying difference-in-differences design, we find that participation in the RECD project led to a significant reduction in urban-rural income disparity. The effects were especially pronounced in less-developed regions, poverty-designated counties, and areas with weaker digital infrastructure and gains were disproportionately concentrated among rural households. These “biased” digital dividends contrast with market-driven e-commerce development, such as Taobao Villages, which tended to exacerbate inequality.
