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Window Dressing in the Public Sector: Evidence from China’s Compulsory Education Promotion Program

Hanming Fang, Chang Liu, Li-An Zhou, Nov 15, 2023

We 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.

Input-Trade Liberalization, Female Skill Intensity, and Fertility in China

Feng Chen, Renliang Liu, Miaojie Yu, Apr 09, 2025

The 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.

What Gets Measured Gets Managed: Investment and the Cost of Capital

Zhiguo He, Guanmin Liao, Baolian Wang, Aug 09, 2023

To improve capital allocative efficiency, starting in 2010, Chinese regulators switched from using return on equity to economic value added (EVA).

Growing Apart: Declining Within- and Across-Village Risk Sharing in Rural China

Orazio Attanasio, Costas Meghir, Corina Mommaerts, and Yu Zheng , May 25, 2022

China has embarked on an ambitious campaign to close income gaps, address regional inequality and unfair social welfare provision, and make solid progress toward common prosperity by 2035. This marks a shift in focus from overall growth to promoting equitable and balanced 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, 2024

How 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..