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on China |
| By: | Nikolov, Plamen; Adelman, Alan |
| Abstract: | Aging populations in developing countries have spurred the introduction of public pension programs to preserve the standard of living for the elderly. The often-overlooked mechanism of intergenerational transfers, however, can dampen these intended policy effects, as adult children who make income contributions to their parents could adjust their behavior in response to changes in their parents’ income. Exploiting a unique policy intervention in China, we examine using a difference-in-difference-in-differences (DDD) approach how a new pension program impacts inter vivos transfers. We show that pension benefits lower the propensity of adult children to transfer income to elderly parents in the context of a large middle-income country, and we also estimate a small crowd-out effect. Taken together, these estimates fit the pattern of previous research in high-income countries, although our estimates of the crowd-out effect are significantly smaller than previous studies in both middle- and high-income countries. |
| Keywords: | life cycle, retirement, pension, inter vivos transfers, middle-income countries, developing countries, China, crowd-out effect, aging |
| JEL: | D64 H3 H55 J1 J14 J22 J26 O1 O12 O15 O16 R2 |
| Date: | 2019–04–20 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:94646&r=all |
| By: | Hanming Fang; Linke Hou; Mingxing Liu; Lixin Colin Xu; Pengfei Zhang |
| Abstract: | We develop a theoretical model of how factional affiliation and local accountability can shape the policy choices of local officials who are concerned about political survivals, and subsequently affect the long-term local development. We provide empirical evidence in support of the theoretical predictions using county-level variations in development performance in Fujian Province in China. When the Communist armies took over Fujian Province from the Nationalist control circa 1949, communist cadres from two different army factions were assigned as county leaders. For decades the Fujian Provincial Standing Committee of the Communist Party was dominated by members from one particular faction, which we refer to as the strong faction. Counties also differed in terms of whether a local guerrilla presence had existed prior to the Communist takeover. We argue that county leaders from the strong faction were less likely to pursue policies friendly to local development because their political survival more heavily relied on their loyalty to the provincial leader than on the grassroots support from local residents. By contrast, the political survival of county leaders from the weak faction largely depended on local grassroots support, which they could best secure if they focused on local development. In addition, a guerrilla presence in a county further improved development performance either by intensifying the local accountability of the county leader, or by better facilitating the provision of local public goods beneficial to development. We find consistent and robust evidence supporting these assumptions. Being affiliated with weak factions and having local accountability are both associated with sizable long-term benefits that are evident in terms of a county’s growth and level of private-sector development, its citizens’ education levels, and their survival rates during the Great Chinese Famine. We also find that being affiliated with the strong faction and adopting pro-local policies are associated with higher likelihood of a local leader’s political survival. |
| JEL: | D72 H70 O1 O43 |
| Date: | 2019–05 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:25901&r=all |
| By: | Emran, M. Shahe; Ferreira, Francisco; Jiang, Yajing; Sun, Yan |
| Abstract: | We extend the Becker-Tomes (1986) model of intergenerational educational mobility to a rural economy characterized by occupational dualism (farm vs. nonfarm) and provide a comparative analysis of rural India and rural China. Using two exceptional data-sets, we estimate father-sons intergenerational educational persistence in farm and nonfarm households free of truncation bias due to coresidency. The sons in rural India faced lower educational mobility compared to the sons in rural China in the 1990s and earlier. Father’s nonfarm occupation and education were complementary in determining a son’s schooling in India, but separable in China. However, the separability observed for the older cohorts in rural China broke down for the younger cohort. Evidence from supplementary data on economic mechanisms shows that the extended Becker-Tomes model provides plausible explanations for both the cross-country heterogeneity (India vs. China), and the evolution of mobility across cohorts in China. |
| Keywords: | Educational Mobility, Rural Economy, Occupational Dualism, Farm-Nonfarm, Complementarity, Coresidency Bias, China, India |
| JEL: | J6 J62 O1 O15 |
| Date: | 2019–05–20 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:94121&r=all |
| By: | Tang, Can (Renmin University of China); Zhao, Liqiu (Renmin University of China); Zhao, Zhong (Renmin University of China) |
| Abstract: | This paper evaluates the effect of a free compulsory education reform in rural China on the incidence of child labor. We exploit the cross-province variation in the roll-out of the reform and apply a difference-in-differences strategy to identify the causal effects of the reform. We find that the exposure to the free compulsory education significantly reduces the incidence of child labor for boys, but has no significant effect on the likelihood of child labor for girls. Specifically, one additional semester of free compulsory education decreases the incidence of child labor for boys by 8.3 percentage points. Moreover, the negative effect of the reform on the likelihood of child labor is stronger for boys from households with lower socioeconomic status. Finally, the free compulsory education reform may induce parents to reallocate resources towards boys within a household and thus may enlarge the gender gap in human capital investment. |
| Keywords: | free compulsory education reform, child labor, son preference, rural China |
| JEL: | I28 I38 O20 |
| Date: | 2019–05 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp12374&r=all |
| By: | Holz, Carsten A. |
| Abstract: | This paper examines the progress of state-owned enterprise (SOE) reform in the People’s Republic of China. After defining SOEs and considering their scope of operation within the PRC economy, the focus of the paper is on the major reform waves that followed the deterioration of SOE profitability in the early 1990s. The oil industry serves to illustrate industry-specific SOE reform trends as well as the latest reform developments. Until today, a stable, successful, long-term arrangement of state ownership has remained elusive. SOE reform is incomplete as long as a number of fundamental governance issues are not resolved. But these are difficult to resolve in the context of Party-controlled state-owned enterprises. |
| Keywords: | State-owned enterprise reform, People’s Republic of China, corporate governance, public enterprise management, Chinese Communist Party, state-owned asset management, industrial policy |
| JEL: | L20 P00 P26 P30 P31 |
| Date: | 2018–12–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:94093&r=all |
| By: | Garg, Teevrat (University of California, San Diego); Gibson, Matthew (Williams College); Sun, Fanglin (University of California, San Diego) |
| Abstract: | How do people in developing countries respond to extreme temperatures? Using individual-level panel data over two decades and relying on plausibly exogenous variation in weather, we estimate howextreme temperatures affect time use in China. Extreme temperatures reduce time spent working, and this effect is largest for female farmers. Hot days reduce time spent by women on outdoor chores, but we find no such effects for men. Finally, hot days dramatically reduce time spent on childcare, reflecting large effects on home production. Taken together, our results suggest time use is an important margin of response to extreme temperatures. |
| Keywords: | time use, extreme weather, gender |
| JEL: | Q54 O13 H53 |
| Date: | 2019–05 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp12372&r=all |
| By: | Carsten A. Holz |
| Abstract: | This paper examines the progress of state-owned enterprise (SOE) reform in the People’s Republic of China. After defining SOEs and considering their scope of operation within the PRC economy, the focus of the paper is on the major reform waves that followed the deterioration of SOE profitability in the early 1990s. The oil industry serves to illustrate industry-specific SOE reform trends as well as the latest reform developments. Until today, a stable, successful, longterm arrangement of state ownership has remained elusive. SOE reform is incomplete as long as a number of fundamental governance issues are not resolved. But these are difficult to resolve in the context of Party-controlled state-owned enterprises. |
| Keywords: | state-owned enterprise reform, People’s Republic of China, corporate governance, public enterprise management, Chinese Communist Party, state-owned asset management, industrial policy |
| JEL: | P00 P31 L20 P26 D22 L32 O25 O53 |
| Date: | 2019 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ces:ceswps:_7688&r=all |
| By: | Bakari, Sayef; Sofien, Tiba |
| Abstract: | One of the major unresolved research issues in agriculture is the question as to whether agricultural investments still a promoter of economic growth at the regional and local levels. The concern is not with the agricultural benefits, principally measured as food security, but whether there are additional development benefits from these investments. In this paper, we have developed a new approach to study the impact of agricultural investment on economic growth. By taking the case of China, this study is based on the Auto-Regressive Distributive Lags (ARDL) approach that is proposed by Pesaran et al (2002). The empirical estimate yields interesting results. In the short and long terms, agricultural investment has a positive effect on economic growth. The findings of this research have important implications for further policy designs that seek to maintain the agricultural sector in China in the future. |
| Keywords: | Agricultural Investment, Economic Growth, China, ARDL. |
| JEL: | C18 C5 O13 O47 O53 Q1 Q10 Q18 |
| Date: | 2019–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:94552&r=all |
| By: | Hu, Bin; Li, Zhengtao; Zhang, Lin |
| Abstract: | This paper estimates the linkages among total Sulphur dioxide (SO2) emissions, total GDP and energy efficiency using China’s provincial panel data from 2002 to 2015. We investigate total emissions rather than per capita emissions or ambient concentrations, since it is total emissions that the environment cares about. Energy efficiency is estimated using stochastic frontier analysis and decomposed into both persistent and transient efficiency. We then investigate the long-run dynamics among SO2 emissions, economic growth and energy efficiency by employing the panel-based error correction model and taking the effects of cyclical variations into account. Our analysis shows that GDP has a positive impact on total SO2 emissions in the short run and gains in energy efficiency have a significant negative effect on emissions in the long run. By controlling the effects of business cycle, the effects of GDP on emissions remain positive in both short and long run. Cross-sectional analysis provides similar insights. We argue that economic growth itself is an emission generator. Therefore, the government needs to establish a long-run strategy to curb the emissions by improving energy efficiency. |
| Keywords: | Sulphur dioxide emissions; energy efficiency; stochastic frontier analysis; error-correction model |
| JEL: | Q0 Q01 Q43 Q56 |
| Date: | 2019–04–15 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:94588&r=all |