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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.
How Do Public Pensions Affect Eldercare Mode and Son Preference? An Empirical Study on the New Rural Pension Scheme in China
Naijia Guo, Wei Huang, Ruixin Wang, Dec 11, 2024How do public pension schemes reshape eldercare and social norms with son preference? Using variations in the timing of the New Rural Pension Scheme (NRPS) across rural Chinese counties..
Input-Trade Liberalization, Female Skill Intensity, and Fertility in China
Feng Chen, Renliang Liu, Miaojie Yu, Apr 09, 2025The interplay between trade liberalization and demographic behavior illuminates the challenges of reconciling career and family. This paper examines how gender-specific trade liberalization influences fertility, leveraging a Bartik-style shift-share instrumental variable strategy that incorporates female skill intensity into input tariff exposure. We find that input-trade liberalization significantly reduces fertility, particularly among highly educated women, private sector employees, and first-time mothers—groups experiencing the steepest career-family trade-offs. Mechanism analysis shows that enhanced labor market prospects raise the opportunity cost of childbearing, delaying or reducing family formation. These findings underscore the socioeconomic implications of trade policy for demographic trends.
Superstition Everywhere
Jeffrey (Jinfan) Chang, Huancheng Du, Mar 09, 2022In Chinese culture, digit 8 (4) is taken as lucky (unlucky). We find that the numerological superstition has a profound impact across China’s stock, bond and foreign exchange markets, affecting asset prices in both the primary and secondary markets. The superstition effect, i.e., the probability of asset price ending with a lucky (unlucky) digit far exceeds (falls short of) what would be expected by chance, is everywhere.
Window Dressing in the Public Sector: Evidence from China’s Compulsory Education Promotion Program
Hanming Fang, Chang Liu, Li-An Zhou, Nov 15, 2023We document public-sector window dressing behavior in China’s Compulsory Education Promotion Program during the 1990s. Window-dressing behavior has been well-documented in various organizations when an agent faces high-stakes incentives.
