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on China |
| By: | Aghion, Philippe; Antonin, Céline; Paluskiewicz, Luc; Strömberg, David; Sun, Xueping; Wargon, Raphaël; Westin, Karolina |
| Abstract: | The 2018 China Initiative by the Trump administration complicated procedures and reduced funding for U.S.-China research collaborations. Using Scopus data, we analyze its impact on Chinese research. We find that it significantly lowered the quality of both publications and co-authors of Chinese researchers with prior U.S. collaborations compared to those with prior European collaborations, and reduced yearly citations for affected researchers by 6%. The effect was stronger for high-productivity Chinese researchers in U.S.-dominated fields. While China is at the forefront of the scientific frontier, it still depends more on the U.S. than the reverse. |
| Keywords: | China initiative;Chinese science;political tensions;science of science |
| JEL: | O31 I23 |
| Date: | 2026–09–11 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ehl:lserod:140961 |
| By: | Min, Yi (University of Birmingham); Elliott, Robert J.R. (University of Birmingham); Melander, Eric (University of Birmingham, CAGE) |
| Abstract: | In this paper we document how deep-seated cultural norms result in unintended demographic responses to two reforms in China: (1) the One-Child Policy and (2) land reform under the Household Responsibility System. Constructing and validating an index of historical patriarchal norms based on soil suitability for plough use and combining this with fertility and sex ratio data, we estimate the heterogeneous impacts of the reforms in a difference-in-differences framework. Results show that in counties characterised by strong patriarchy, where son preference is plausibly higher, families with a firstborn girl resisted population control and saw smaller decreases in second-child fertility after the implementation of the One-Child Policy. Moreover, land reform heightened the male-bias in the second-child sex ratio among firstborn-girl families, resulting in approximately 0.89 million missing girls in high-patriarchy counties as a result of norms-induced sex selection. Our results reveal an enduring legacy of historical norms and the importance of cultural forces as drivers of gender (in)equality. |
| Keywords: | Patriarchal norms, son preference, One-Child Policy, land reform. JEL Classification: J13, J16, N35, O15, Q18, Z13 |
| Date: | 2026 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cge:wacage:823 |
| By: | Zhang, Xin; Wang, Yixuan; Hu, Xingyi; Chen, Xi |
| Abstract: | We examine how prenatal exposure to air pollution interacts with gender-biased parental investments to shape long-run cognitive performance. Using nationally representative survey data from China, we show that fetal PM2.5 exposure significantly reduces cognitive ability for women, particularly among those with brothers. Our evidence suggests that the family investment channel operates primarily through education rather than health, with gender-biased educational resource allocation compounding negative outcomes for females. Specifically, conditional on the same level of fetal PM2.5 exposure, females receive less homework assistance from their families and attain lower levels of education. |
| Keywords: | fetal pollution exposure, cognitive ability, parental investment, gender disparities |
| JEL: | D13 Q53 J16 I24 |
| Date: | 2026 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:glodps:1814 |
| By: | Wang, Junkai |
| Abstract: | This study examines the impact of data factor marketization on the ESG performance of companies listed in the Shanghai and Shenzhen A-share markets in China. An empirical analysis of data from 2009 to 2022 reveals that the marketization of data factors significantly enhances corporate ESG performance, with more pronounced effects observed in heavily polluting and non-high-tech enterprises. The positive influence of data factor marketization on ESG performance is mediated through mechanisms such as promoting digital transformation, alleviating financing constraints, and reducing agency costs. Furthermore, the research uncovers the heterogeneous effects of data factor marketization across different regions and corporate characteristics, with companies in regions with higher marketization levels and the eastern part of China benefiting more significantly. This study fills a gap in the literature regarding the relationship between data factor marketization and corporate ESG performance, constructing a comprehensive analytical framework that extends the application boundaries of ESG theory in the big data era. It provides theoretical and empirical support for government policy-making and corporate strategic planning. |
| Keywords: | Data factor marketization; Corporate ESG performance; Digital transformation; Financing constraints; Agency costs |
| Date: | 2026–04–30 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:akf:cafewp:42 |
| By: | Wei Qiao; Lianming Zhu |
| Abstract: | This paper studies how heterogeneous factor-augmenting productivity shapes factor allocation, aggregate labor share, and misallocation. In Chinese manufacturing, more labor-productive firms have lower labor shares, higher capital intensity, and lower employment. We first prove that, under empirically motivated restrictions on factor-market frictions, this joint pattern requires heterogeneity in relative factor-augmenting productivity. We then develop an approach that simultaneously identifies firm-level capital- and labor-augmenting productivities, labor markdowns, and marginal capital expenditures. As a validation exercise, we exploit China’s value-added tax reform that lowered equipment costs and find that the calibrated ratio of capital-augmenting to labor-augmenting productivity rises. Counterfactuals show that this ratio is central to the employment-productivity relationship and the aggregate labor share. Accounting for this heterogeneity shifts the inferred composition of misallocation toward capital and reverses the comovement of the marginal revenue products of capital and labor. |
| Date: | 2026–09 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:dpr:wpaper:1321 |
| By: | Jackson, James; Larsen, Mathias |
| Abstract: | There is an ongoing debate amongst scholars as to whether democratic or authoritarian political systems are more effective in achieving climate policy outcomes. In this article, we follow the latter trend through the concept of eco-authoritarianism, proposing that it is the appropriate way to understand China’s approach to the green transition. Drawing on primary and secondary data on China’s electric vehicle (EV) transition, we make two contributions to the environmental politics literature. First, we go beyond the current high-level theorising of eco-authoritarianism by identifying political architecture, ambitions & priorities, and state capacity as key to applying the concept. Second, we provide an empirical account of China’s EV transition through these dimensions as core features of eco-authoritarianism, finding that they create policy durability – effective coordination of policies across the state apparatus, policy consistency over time, and market-shaping levels of policy support. |
| Keywords: | China;climate policy;eco-authoritarianism;eElectric vehicles;green transition;industrial policy |
| JEL: | R14 J01 |
| Date: | 2026–09–12 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ehl:lserod:140991 |
| By: | Ying Bai; Xiaoyu Bian; Ruixue Jia |
| Abstract: | Transportation networks often radiate from national capitals, reflecting political priorities as much as economic logic. How costly is infrastructure built for politics rather than markets? We study China’s Grand Canal: when the Mongols moved the capital from the central plain to Beijing, the canal followed, bypassing the economic core it once served. Using a grid-year panel spanning five dynasties (8th–19th centuries), we show the route best suited to reach the capital predicts the canal’s actual path. This redesign reshaped market access and, through it, population. Counterfactual analysis shows the canal raised population by 2.5–6.1%, but its politically motivated redesign cost 1.1–2.2%. |
| JEL: | N45 N75 O18 R12 |
| Date: | 2026–09 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:35721 |
| By: | Sandambi, Nerhum |
| Abstract: | The numbers of Public enterprise are explored on this approach, particularly to understand the respective impacts on the economy. Thus, the study show that, some developing Countries naturally have significant numbers of Public enterprise, however, these numbers of Public enterprise not influence negatively the economy, for example, China have high than numbers of Public Enterprise of the Nigeria, furthermore, the China have particularly less than poverty that exist on Nigeria, in particular. The existence of high numbers of Public Enterprises, can particularly constitute the highest influences, from the majority Companies to create naturally important affirmation of these Companies on the economy in particular. However, the regionalisation of public enterprise, reveals that the region's can be impulsioned to create and to drive the economy growth of these respective regions in general, followed by the some institutions decentralisation, in particular. Thus, in particular, the numbers of Public enterprise, not are strongly enough to contribute to the poverty, however, existence of high numbers of Public enterprise constitutes the high stimulus of budgets that's proven from the public expenditure in particular. Decentralisation of public enterprise, in majority case can for example impulse the economy and impulse significantly the regional economy, mainly on the regions where the economy are particularly weak and where naturally not existed the strongest affirmation of these respective Companies, however, the productivity are particularly evidenced with more efficiency. |
| Date: | 2026–09–03 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:osf:socarx:3ngey_v1 |
| By: | Qin Chen; Ying Fang; Xiangyu Wang; Leo Yang Yang |
| Abstract: | How do we define an occupation? By its job title? An accountant at a small trading company keeps the books; at a listed firm the same title demands a certified-accountant licence, and the week goes to the reports that regulators and the board read. Same title, different bar, different work. What defines an occupation is who it lets in and what it asks them to do. In a rapidly changing labor market, tracking those requirements and tasks is how to take the market's pulse. Yet no instrument reads both at the speed they change. Official occupational directories like O*NET report one national average per occupation, updated every few years. Job postings are timely but unstructured. Research built on them works from job titles plus proprietary skill keywords, which blur what is asked of a candidate into what a candidate is asked to do. The blur matters, because rising requirements and changing tasks are different events with different causes. We separate them. From 752.6 million job ads posted on China's five leading recruitment platforms between 2022 and 2026, we extract the phrases employers write, unify those that name the same thing, and validate the mapping from text back to entry. By doing so we construct two catalogs, 20, 721 requirements a candidate must meet and 44, 479 tasks the hire will do. With the entries standardized, we annotate them further. Each task, for example, carries a score for how far a language model could absorb it. Matched back onto every ad, the catalogs read the market month by month. Two examples show what the layer beneath the job title buys. First, the occupational registry records one accountant where the ads record a staircase, the junior certificate at the bottom of the wage range and the intermediate one at the top. Second, counting occupations says the work most exposed to language models is disappearing, and counting tasks says far less of it is. |
| Date: | 2026–08 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arx:papers:2608.26924 |
| By: | Marc-Antoine Faure; César Ducruet |
| Abstract: | Container shipping has become a cornerstone of global supply chains, regional integration, and port-city development. The globalization of trade and, at the same time, the increased vulnerability of supply chains have created a more efficient yet fragile system. In this chapter, using a unique dataset of more than four million ship movements, we uncover the local and global dynamics of container flows. Starting in the 1970s, with the diffusion of container technology in international trade, we analyse fifty years of global trade through the lens of network structures and community detection. We document (i) an almost continuous expansion in nodes and links with improving topological efficiency up to the mid-2010s, followed by (ii) the consequences of recent shocks, such as COVID-19, Red Sea disruptions, and the Panama Canal drought, which highlights the vulnerability of the container shipping network. Using single linkage analysis, we also show the evolution of trade dependencies, the emergence of China particularly towards Africa over the last decade, and the persistence of certain port systems such as the European system around Rotterdam. We open a new avenue of research by combining global and local, systemic and long-term quantitative analyses to understand the dynamics of international trade. |
| Keywords: | complex networks; international trade; container shipping |
| JEL: | F14 R40 L91 |
| Date: | 2026 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:drm:wpaper:2026-19 |
| By: | Xu, Danchen |
| Abstract: | Chinese universities have launched a wave of “AI+X” programs that train students in professional domains—architecture, journalism, accounting, teaching—to use generative AI tools, often before any consensus exists that AI-assisted learning improves educational outcomes. Empirical research to date finds no reliable improvement in grades, documents cognitive offloading, and leaves long-term learning effects unmeasured. This paper asks whether that disconnect between institutional acceleration and empirical uncertainty surfaces in discourse: do official and public articulations of AI’s role in education differ in epistemic certainty, and is any such gap innate or emergent? We construct two corpora spanning 2020–2026—official discourse (policy documents and official-media posts, n = 691) and public discourse (Weibo, n = 11, 345)—and measure four dimensions of epistemic stance (certainty markers, presupposition, hedging, and tolerance of uncertainty) using a hybrid design that pairs a transparent dictionary with LLM zero-shot coding, cross-validated at a mean Cohen's κ of .926. Three findings stand out. First, before ChatGPT the two corpora were epistemically indistinguishable, replicating Zeng, Chan, and Schäfer’s (2020) “striking similarity”; the gap emerged only after 2023. Second, the gap is not unidirectional: official discourse presupposes AI’s value more (D2 = 82.8% vs. 77.2%; policy documents 90.7%) yet hedges and acknowledges uncertainty significantly more than the public does (D3 and D4 reversed)—a pattern we term institutional hedging. Third, public epistemic stance is bimodal (absolute assertion or absolute doubt), whereas official discourse is layered across premise and expression. Time-series and difference-in-differences analyses locate two shocks—ChatGPT (2023) broke the stance layer (public D2 fell from 82% to 52%), and DeepSeek-R1 (2025) deepened the expression layer (D3 reached its series maximum)—suggesting the public underwent an epistemic learning process, first learning to doubt and then to qualify. We contribute a measurable, multidimensional discourse variable for the certainty gap and a hybrid coding template for large-scale epistemic-stance annotation. |
| Date: | 2026–09–02 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:osf:socarx:upmt3_v1 |
| By: | Shuaizhang Feng; Lars Lefgren; Jieyi Liu; Brennan Platt; Xiaoyu Xia |
| Abstract: | We study age discrimination in a labor market with a job ladder, where worker productivity is revealed over time. Using data from a large Chinese recruitment platform that links job postings, applications, and employer responses, we document sharp declines in applications and callbacks at posted age cutoffs. Discrimination operates in both directions: older applicants are disadvantaged in entry-level jobs, while younger applicants are less likely to be hired into managerial roles. A model of statistical discrimination with imperfect signal screening explains these patterns. Consistent with the model, older applicants to entry-level jobs are negatively selected relative to their peers. |
| JEL: | J71 |
| Date: | 2026–09 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:35709 |