Demand for Retirement Insurance: What Do People Want?

This article discusses the diversity and preference variations in the demand for retirement insurance among urban residents in China, particularly the high demand for health-related insurance such as critical illness (CI) and long-term care (LTC) insurance, and how individual financial circumstances, risk appetites, and bequest motives significantly influence their choice of retirement insurance products.

Environmental Externalities, Product Attributes, and Market Power: Implications for Government Subsidies

The article discusses how attribute-based subsidy (ABS) designs lead to higher product quality and more effectively mitigate market power than uniform subsidies, albeit with a modest environmental cost.

Can Environmental Regulation Enhance Productivity? Evidence from China’s Industrial Sector

Our study also contributes to the broader discourse on industrial policy (see Juhász, Lane, and Rodrik 2023 for a recent review of related academic literature). As debates about green industrial policy gains traction in the U.S., Europe, and beyond, there is revived interest in developing a better understanding of how it might impact economic activity. Although economic growth and environmental regulation are often pitted against each other, our findings suggest that this need not be the case.

Cooperative Culture and the Birth of Modern Enterprises in China

Excessive Issuance of New Funds in China and Implications for Investor Protection

The Chinese mutual fund industry is only one-tenth the size of its US counterpart, but the number of funds in China has surpassed that of the US. Our study shows that such a large number of funds is unhealthy: managers issue new funds repetitively with different custodian banks, resulting in the average manager overseeing 2.7 funds. Managers shift profits to new funds in order to attract more flows. Among funds under the same manager, new funds have higher returns than old funds, spurring concerns over investor protection.