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| 1 |
ID:
192321
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| Summary/Abstract |
Grade inflation has become a global phenomenon that raises concerns in the academia and the public. This study examines whether high grades accompanying with the growth of female teachers arise from student improvement or grade inflation. We use randomly assigned samples from the China Education Panel Survey and obtain the following results. (1) Students taught by female teachers obtain 1.57 grades point higher compared with those taught by male teachers. High grades do not result from student progress but from grade inflation. (2) Female teachers practice grade inflation for different students, and the effect is more pronounced among female students, low-ability students, and students in senior grades. (3) Female teachers may adopt a high-grades practice due to potential pressures under discrimination and uncertainty rather than for the sake of course or students. (4) Last, high grades brought by female teachers lead to less effort for students in the second year. This paper not only provides data support for understanding the increasing grade inflation, but also offers clear implications for the improvement of evaluation systems.
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| 2 |
ID:
192341
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| Summary/Abstract |
The spread of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has caused school closures in most countries, affecting over 90% of the world's student population. School closures can widen learning inequalities and disproportionately hurt vulnerable students. We collected data on the exam scores of university applicants in China before and after a two-month period of school closure. We observe that students from rural, lower-income households are more negatively affected by school closures compared to their urban, higher-income counterparts. The inequality effect remains sizable in the admission exam three months after schools reopen. To strengthen the causal interpretation of the results, we investigate the scores in the previous graduating cohorts who did not experience school closure, and find no evidence of the change in scores over the same calendar period. Our study points to the urgent need to address the educational inequality caused by school closures.
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| 3 |
ID:
192342
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| Summary/Abstract |
We provide evidence that material inducements for Covid-19 vaccination may backfire. Results from a hypothetical survey experiment in China (N = 1365) show incentives of 8–125 USD reduce vaccine uptake intentions compared to simply offering vaccination for free. Ours is the first Covid-19 vaccine study to separately consider and directly compare the effects of monetary and goods-based incentives, both of which have been widely employed by countries seeking to increase uptake; we demonstrate that both types backfire equally. Results are compared against the burgeoning literature on Covid-19 vaccine incentives.
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| 4 |
ID:
192324
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| Summary/Abstract |
This study explores the liquidity insurance role of Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL). As a complementary study to Bian et al. (2023), we provide institutional background and mechanism analysis of BNPL's consumption-boosting effects. Since a significant consumption boosting effect exists even for individuals who did not draw on the BNPL credit line, we argue that BNPL provides liquidity insurance by releasing preexisting precautionary liquidity reserves into consumption. We also explore several robustness checks and heterogeneity analyses.
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| 5 |
ID:
192340
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| Summary/Abstract |
Trade liberalization in the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) not only contributes to regional economic growth but also leads to an increase in energy consumption and carbon emissions, which may exacerbate climate change risks. This study aims to explore the carbon pricing issue in the context of the RCEP framework. Additionally, for the sake of carbon equity, we introduce a differentiated carbon pricing scheme based on the cost fairness principle (CPCF), and the unified carbon pricing was used for a cost effectiveness analysis. The empirical analysis was conducted with a global multi-regional computable general equilibrium model. The results show that with the help of trade liberalization, the RCEP's GDP, energy consumption, and carbon emissions may increase by 0.639%, 1.962%, and 1.897%, respectively. The CPCF scheme, wherein developed countries assume the primary abatement burden, can be used to offset the increase in carbon emissions from trade liberalization while RCEP members maintain positive economic growth. The total abatement cost of the CPCF for carbon offsets in the RCEP can be reduced via unified carbon pricing, and the cost-saving effect approaches 24.24%. Unified carbon pricing may result in a carbon price of US $5.83 within the RCEP. As such, this study explores carbon pricing in the context of trade liberalization, and its findings will be valuable for the RCEP to achieve a win-win situation in terms of economic growth and climate change.
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| 6 |
ID:
192330
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| Summary/Abstract |
Using data from the China Household Income Project in 2013 and 2018, this paper studies relative poverty among rural hukou holders living in urban China and urban hukou holders. People living in households with an income below a fixed percent of the median per-capita income and wealth below the same fixed percent of the median per-capita wealth among urban residents are deemed as relative poor. Although migrants with rural hukou living in urban China were more prone to twice poverty than urban residents in 2013, this was not generally the case in 2018.
A multivariate analysis shows several factors to be related to the probability of being twice relative poor. Even considering these factors, a rural hukou status increased the probability of being twice relative poor in 2013. In contrast, such an excess risk of being twice relative poor was much lesser outspoken in middle and low-ranking cities in 2018. However, rural to urban migrants living in high-ranking cities had a somewhat higher risk of being relative poor than urban residents with the same characteristics in 2018.
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| 7 |
ID:
192322
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| Summary/Abstract |
As urbanization and economic development continue to accelerate, social equity issues are becoming increasingly prominent and the urban–rural income gap is an important manifestation of this. This study uses the data of urban clusters from 2010 to 2019 and focuses on the relationship between the polycentric spatial structure of urban clusters and the urban–rural income gap. The findings show that the development of urban cluster polycentricity can reduce the urban–rural income gap, and the higher the degree of polycentricity in morphology, the smaller the gap. However, the relationship between polycentric spatial structure and the urban–rural income gap is “U” shaped, indicating the need for rational planning of urban polycentric development patterns rather than simple expansion. In addition, the polycentric spatial structure of urban clusters can reduce regional disparities by promoting factor mobility and industrial structure optimization. However, this depends on the level of industrial development and infrastructure. This study highlights the importance of a balanced approach to urban development that takes into account regional disparities and issues of social equity.
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| 8 |
ID:
192337
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| Summary/Abstract |
The intergenerational transmission of education in China has drawn extensive public and academic attention. This paper explores the differences in the amount of time Chinese parents spend on childcare stratified by education level and investigates the factors driving these differences. The analysis shows that more educated parents devote more time to childcare than less-educated parents. The educational differences in parental childcare time are particularly pronounced among working parents, parents with school-age children, and parents in the provinces where educational institutions are relatively scarce. Much of the extra childcare time is directed to educational care and travel with children. Compared to households in which the mother has less than a junior high school education, households with university-educated mothers spend 74 min more per day on childcare, with 58% of the extra time devoted to children's learning and education.
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| 9 |
ID:
192334
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| Summary/Abstract |
This paper provides the first study to explore the relationship between exposure to ambient temperatures during pregnancy and adolescent mental health in China. The results show that experiencing one more hot day relative to local historical contemporaneous average values during pregnancy significantly increases the likelihood of mental health disorders in adolescence. The impact is larger in the first and second trimesters. Individuals born in the northern region and whose mothers work in agriculture are more vulnerable to high temperatures. Prenatal exposure to hot days is more harmful to the mental health of older adolescents. Additionally, the adverse effects are similar for both men and women and individuals with rural and urban hukou. Biological effects, income effects, and human capital accumulation might be three operative channels of the impact. These findings add to the evidence on the lasting health effects of early life exposure to climatic shocks and call for policy interventions during pregnancy.
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| 10 |
ID:
192339
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| Summary/Abstract |
The adoption of high-value cash crops (HVCs) is considered an efficient way to improve farmers' productivity and welfare, although the systematic empirical evidence is limited. By exploiting an exogenous commercial shock for soybeans and microlevel rural survey data from Manchuria of China in the 1930s, where factor markets were relatively well functioning, this study investigates the influence of HVC cultivation on farmers' agricultural performance, welfare, and inequality both theoretically and empirically. We find that (i) larger farms devote a larger proportion of land to HVCs and that (ii) farmers who cultivate a larger proportion of HVCs have higher agricultural productivity, profit, net income, and expenditure. Furthermore, the adoption of HVCs lowers profit, income, and expenditure inequality by enhancing income from wages relative to land rents, which benefits households with less land.
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| 11 |
ID:
192345
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| Summary/Abstract |
This study investigates the environmental consequences of fuel price shocks, using a rich dataset from the Chinese megacity of Hangzhou. Our identification strategy is mainly aided by instrumenting fuel price using exogenous global oil prices. We find that a 10% increase in fuel price leads to a 10.29%–11.45% decrease in driving demand, reflected by road congestion index, and a 17.6%–20.27% decrease in industrial activities, measured by electricity consumption. The decreases in driving demand and industrial activities are indeed correlated with air quality improvement and decline in major pollutant concentrations. While the findings shed light on the short-term environmental outcomes of price-based measures, the negative effects of fuel price increases on industrial activities may generate undesirable impacts on macroeconomy in the long-term perspective. Despite ample evidence demonstrating that drivers respond to fuel price changes, considerably fewer studies investigate their environmental and economic consequences. This study addresses this gap in the literature and contributes to a better understanding of the effects of fuel price shocks on air pollution and economic activities.
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| 12 |
ID:
192320
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| Summary/Abstract |
This study investigates the relationship between family size and parents’ labor market performance, measured by labor supply and occupational prestige scores, based on three census waves in 1990, 2000, and 2010. To address the endogeneity problem of family size, we use the indicator of twins at first birth as an instrumental variable. Our results suggest that in nuclear households, family size affects the labor market performance only of mothers, not of fathers, with the negative effects fading and gradually disappearing over time. More specifically, an increase in family size decreases female labor supply in the 1990 wave, leads to lower prestige scores among working mothers in the 2000 wave, and has no impact on labor supply or occupational prestige scores in the 2010 wave. Our subsample analysis indicates that the negative effects of family size are more severe for parents of households with all children under seven years old and for husbands or wives with lower education level than that of their partners. In addition, we find that the negative effects of family size on parental labor market outcomes are not observed in extended households, especially when no grandparents are aged 65 years or older.
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| 13 |
ID:
192323
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| Summary/Abstract |
This paper examines how the adoption of FinTech affects household consumption in the presence of economic uncertainty. We use regional-level FinTech adoption and economic uncertainty measurement, along with representative household-level consumption data, to investigate this issue. Our empirical analysis shows that while high levels of economic uncertainty lead to a shift in household consumption from services to non-durable goods, widespread adoption of FinTech overcomes this negative effect and prevents the reduction in service spending. We use the distance of a household from Hangzhou and the economic uncertainty in the United States as proxies for exogenous variation in FinTech adoption and economic uncertainty in China, respectively, and find similar results. Focusing on the transmission channel, we find that FinTech helps alleviate credit constraints, contributes to entrepreneurship and employment opportunities, and thus mitigates the negative impact of economic uncertainty on household consumption.
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| 14 |
ID:
192343
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| Summary/Abstract |
The inefficient use of healthcare resources is a persisting challenge to almost all healthcare systems, making it imperative to understand the underlying factors of healthcare demand. This paper investigates patients' health-seeking behavior in rural China using a random coefficients logit model. We further perform a counterfactual simulation and welfare analyses to evaluate the inefficiencies in health services utilization. The counterfactual simulation reallocates patients to more efficient health providers following the principles of the hierarchical medical system. Our analysis suggests that out-of-pocket expenses and distance to providers discourage patients from utilizing healthcare, while quality of care has a positive effect on patients' hospital choices. However, significant heterogeneity exists in patient preferences over quality of care, out-of-pocket expenses, and distance to providers. The simulation results show that the overall welfare change may have masked variations related to the hypothetical change, with societal welfare loss from switching to higher-tier providers. Our analysis provides support for policies to improve hospitals and assist rural patients in financing healthcare in China.
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| 15 |
ID:
192329
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| Summary/Abstract |
Household energy transition is a critical tool for air pollution mitigation and energy inequality reduction. The effectiveness of the transition largely relies on not only households' decision to participate but also their sustained use of clean energy after participation. However, the sustained use of clean energy has not yet received sufficient attention in policy making and in literature. This study examines China's Household Clean Heating program, which has switched millions of households' heating energy sources from coal to electricity and gas. We focus on both households' adoption and coal substitution behavior in the program. Based on the large-scale household survey conducted in rural areas of Northern China, we find that both high subsidies and compulsory measures effectively increased the household adoption rate; however, the latter did not guarantee sustained use of clean energy. We also find that In-person and repeated dissemination of program information had a better effect on involvement than passive announcements. Moreover, lower-income households were less likely to participate. Our findings suggest effective implementation approaches and supplementary measures to promote household energy transition, with fewer negative consequences for participants, particularly for the participants with lower income.
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| 16 |
ID:
192335
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| Summary/Abstract |
Challenges coexist with opportunities for achieving carbon neutrality through power sector reform. Based on the ongoing reform in China and generator-level data in 2019, we identify three channels through which the reform could affect carbon emissions. We analyze the theoretical mechanisms under a long-term average cost competition framework, evaluate the emission reduction potentials of the three channels, explore the obstacles in achieving these potentials, and propose corresponding solutions. We find the following: (1) By reshaping the generation competition between high-efficiency and low-efficiency coal-fired generators, the reform has the potential to reduce carbon emissions by 205.4 million tons. However, considering the high financial costs of high-efficiency generators, realizing the full potential is difficult. (2) Administrative promotion of renewable energy could reduce carbon emissions by 311 million tons, but with large implicit expenses, which makes the promotion unsustainable. (3) The price dividend induced by the reform could increase carbon emissions by 98.1 million tons. To achieve emission reduction potentials in the first two channels and offset the rebound effect in the third channel, we propose explicitly pricing carbon. Without other supporting measures, a carbon price of over 400 Chinese yuan per ton of carbon dioxide is essential for the reform to eliminate barriers to its implementation.
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| 17 |
ID:
192338
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| Summary/Abstract |
How will the development of digital finance affect corporate tax compliance? In the digital economic age, this is a crucial issue. Using the 2011–2015 national tax survey database (NTSD) and the Peking University digital finance index, this paper examines the causal relationship between digital finance and small business tax compliance. Our baseline results show that each standard deviation increase in the digital finance index reduces the level of tax noncompliance by 7.5% for small businesses. We exclude the interference of contemporaneous policies, utilize a specification design based on neighboring cities across provincial borders, and employ instrumental variable estimation methods to jointly alleviate concerns about endogeneity. Furthermore, mechanism analysis shows that digital finance impacts small business tax noncompliance by easing corporate financing constraints and capturing tax-related “digital information”. Finally, we analyze the heterogeneous effects of digital finance development. The effects on tax noncompliance are weaker for large firms (placebo group), small businesses supported by the government's industrial policy, and small businesses located in poor credit environment areas.
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| 18 |
ID:
192325
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| Summary/Abstract |
We examine the effect of Fintech on the market structure of traditional financial markets, and focus particularly on InsurTech and the insurance sector. We find that InsurTech has significantly reduced the non-life insurance sector's market concentration but plays a limited role in the life insurance sector's market structure. The results are not driven by potential reverse causality and remain unchanged when we employ an instrumental variables approach and use an alternative supply-side InsurTech index. We further explore the underlying mechanisms and find that, instead of competing directly with insurance companies, Fintech companies provide insurance technologies to traditional insurers and help them lower entry barriers and reduce operating costs. Our paper sheds light on how InsurTech is reshaping traditional insurance sectors, and the results are generalizable to Fintech and financial markets.
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| 19 |
ID:
192344
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| Summary/Abstract |
The debate has long prevailed as to whether the financial sectors can enhance energy efficiency. We attempt to provide new insight into this debate from the perspective of commercial bank branch expansion. This paper manually collects the longitude and latitude of commercial bank branches and manufacturing firms in China, and constructs multiple bank branch expansion variables at the firm level. Then, by utilizing Environmental Survey and Reporting database, Annual Survey of Industrial Firms, and firm-level patent application dataset from 1998 to 2009, this paper empirically examines the impact of commercial bank branch expansion on firms' energy efficiency for the first time and discusses the potential impact channels. We find that the expansion of commercial bank branches within a radius of 10 km of firms has improved the manufacturing firms' energy efficiency. Furthermore, we also confirm that there exist multiple heterogeneous nexuses between the bank branch expansion and energy efficiency. Finally, the financial availability caused by the bank branch expansion is not able to affect the energy efficiency, whereas the bank competition will increase the energy efficiency. Also, the bank branch expansion increases energy efficiency by promoting capital renewal instead of technological innovation.
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| 20 |
ID:
192328
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| Summary/Abstract |
This paper explores the effect of digital finance adoption on women's bargaining power within the family. Empirical analysis finds that higher digital finance adoption significantly improves women's bargaining power and thus alleviates intra-household inequality. We explain the underlying mechanism in terms of women's participation in both labor and financial market. The subsample regression results show that the impact differs among families with distinct characteristics in terms of regions, family living patterns and women's fertility status. This paper provides a new perspective for understanding the inclusive contribution of digital finance and forms a timely complement to the literature in related fields.
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