Stanford Center on China’s Economy and Institutions is a joint effort of the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies and Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research.
In the Wall Street Journal, journalist Stella Yifan Xie refers to Scott Rozelle's research on rural unemployment in China in her article looking at the dwindling opportunities migrant workers have in China.
On February 7, 2023, the Stanford Center on China’s Economy and Institutions (SCCEI) collaborated with the CSIS Trustee Chair in Chinese Business and Economics to host the Big Data China event, “How Private are Chinese Companies?” SCCEI’s co-director, Scott Rozelle, introduced the event while Scott Kennedy, the Trustee Chair Director, hosted. Professors Curtis Milhaupt of Stanford Law School and Lauren Yu-Hsin Lin of the City University of Hong Kong School of Law discussed their research (see two SCCEI China Briefs highlighting their work: China’s Corporate Social Credit System and Its Implications and CCP Influence Over China’s Corporate Governance). Their presentation was followed by a discussion of the implications for U.S.-China relations and U.S. policy with experts Barry Naughton of UC San Diego, Martin Chorzempa of the Peterson Institute for International Economics, and Trustee Chair Senior Fellow Ilaria Mazzocco.
Curtis Milhaupt and Lauren Yu-Hsin Lin’s research explored two separate channels of potential CCP influence over China’s corporations: i) a set of initiatives called the “party-building” or dangjian policy that China’s central government launched in 2015 intending to strengthen and formalize the role of the CCP in China’s SOEs; and ii) China’s corporate social credit system (CSCS), a data-driven scoring system to rate the “trustworthiness” of all business entities registered in China. Panelists offered some initial reactions, agreeing that Milhaupt and Lin’s findings suggest that there is indeed separation between the public sector and private sector, as the data show substantial variation in the ability of the party to exercise control of firms across the state-owned and private sectors. Nonetheless, the scope for a truly private sector is becoming increasingly narrower as the lines blur between the two sectors.
The subsequent discussion included a range of implications for U.S.-China relations and suggestions for policy action. While panelists agreed that Lin and Milhaupt’s findings underscore important distinctions in the party’s role in state-owned and private firms, some suggested that because the lines are increasingly blurry, policymakers should essentially treat the two sectors the same way. However, others suggested that Lin and Milhaupt’s research could be used as a sort of “how-to guide” for policymakers in understanding the varying degrees of party influence in the private sector. Meanwhile, panelists collectively underscored the need for regulations on the U.S. side mandating transparency by China’s corporations in an effort to avoid ad hoc regulation created after problems emerge, as in the case of TikTok.
Watch the entire event below for more.
Hosted in collaboration with the CSIS Trustee Chair in Chinese Business and Economics, this Big Data China event provided an overview of the latest data-driven research evaluating the influence of China’s party-state on China’s companies and their ability to maintain autonomy.
We link industrial clusters, regional productivity and resource reallocation efficiency with geographical and sectoral disaggregated data. Based on a county-industry level panel from 1998 to 2007 in China, we find that industrial clusters significantly increase local industries' productivity by lifting the average firm productivity and reallocating resources from less to more productive firms. Moreover, we find major mechanisms through which resource reallocation is improved within clusters: (i) clusters are associated with a higher firm turnover with increased entry and exit rates simultaneously; and (ii) within clusters' environment, the dispersion of individual firm's markup is significantly reduced, indicating intensified local competition within clusters. Such results suggest that industrial clusters in China help improve regional productivity and resource allocation efficiency with intensified competition and accelerated firm dynamics. The identification issues are carefully addressed by two-stage estimations with instrumental variables and other robustness checks.
In each of the three waves of the Section 301 tariffs on Chinese imports, the US government exempted some products on the originally proposed list from additional duties. Using these exempted products as the counterfactual, we identify modest but heterogeneous impacts of the tariffs on the value of US imports from China. We find a complete pass-through for the first and second waves of tariffs. However, unlike in previous studies, we estimate a very limited tariff pass-through of the third wave of tariffs. Finally, we find little import diversion for the US and significant export diversion for China.
The event will be webcast live from this page.
In this event on February 7 at 8 a.m. PT / 11 a.m. ET, the Stanford Center on China’s Economy and Institutions (SCCEI) and the CSIS Trustee Chair in Chinese Business and Economics present their latest Big Data China publication. The feature provides an overview of the latest data-driven research evaluating the influence of the Chinese party-state on Chinese corporations and their ability to maintain autonomy.
CSIS Trustee Chair Director Scott Kennedy will host the event, which will include an introduction by Professor Scott Rozelle of Stanford University. Professors Curtis Milhaupt of Stanford Law School and Lauren Yu-Hsin Lin of the City University of Hong Kong School of Law will discuss their research on the topic, followed by a discussion on the implications for U.S.-China relations and U.S. policy with distinguished panellists Barry Naughton of UC San Diego, Martin Chorzempa of the Peterson Institute for International Economics, and CSIS Trustee Chair Senior Fellow Ilaria Mazzocco.
| Scott Kennedy Senior Adviser and Trustee Chair in Chinese Business and Economics | Ilaria Mazzocco Senior Fellow, Trustee Chair in Chinese Business and Economics |
| Scott Rozelle Co-director at Stanford Center on China's Economy and Institutions | Barry Naughton So Kwan Lok Chair of Chinese International Affairs, UC San Diego |
| Curtis J. Milhaupt William F. Baxter-Visa International Professor of Law, Stanford Law School | Lauren Yu-Hsin Lin Associate Professor, School of Law, City University of Hong Kong |
| Martin Chorzempa Senior Fellow, Peterson Institute for International Economics | |
Virtual Livestream
The Stanford Center on China’s Economy and Institutions and Asia Society Policy Institute’s Center for China Analysis co-organized a closed-door roundtable on the scope, impact, and implications of China’s industrial policy. The roundtable focused on an intensified round of industrial policies in China that gained momentum around 2014. Beijing announced its “Made in China 2025” plan in 2015, quickly followed by its 2016 “Innovation-driven Development Strategy.” The strategy specifically focused on the emerging technological revolution, targeting sectors such as next generation information technology, advanced manufacturing, biotechnology, and digital media.
Since the announcements, industrial policy has increasingly become a central feature of Chinese economic development efforts and ongoing public debates about the future of U.S.-China competition and the global economic and geopolitical order. Around the world, effectiveness of national industrial policies has become a key point of policy and political contention. In addition, carefully judging the impact of Beijing’s industrial policy is also now critical to accurately assessing the long-term performance and sustainability of China’s economic growth model.
The full report on the roundtable, conducted under the Chatham House Rule, recounts a candid discussion that coalesced around the examination of five key questions:
In partnership with Asia Society Policy Institute's Center for China Analysis
The Stanford Center on China’s Economy and Institutions and Asia Society Policy Institute’s Center for China Analysis co-organized a closed-door roundtable on the scope, impact, and implications of China’s industrial policy and produced a summary report of the discussion.
After nearly two decades of rising wages for those in the unskilled sectors of China's economy, in the mid-2010s employment and wages in China began to experience new polarizing trends. Using data from the National Bureau of Statistics of China, this paper examines trends in multiple sectors and subeconomies of China, revealing the substantial rise of employment in informal, low-skilled services as well as the steady decline of wage growth in the informal subeconomy. At the same time, we find that although employment growth in the formal subeconomy is relatively moderate, wage growth in high-skilled services is steadily rising. These two trends pose a challenge for China, presenting a new and uncertain period of economic change.
This paper estimates the labor market impacts of parenthood in China. We find that becoming a mother has negative impacts on women's labor outcomes. But the impacts appear to recover sooner than what has been found in other countries. A decomposition exercise suggests that parenthood plays a limited role in explaining the large gender inequality in China's labor market. We document a form of intergenerational arrangement that is prevalent among Chinese families: Upon the arrival of a child, grandmothers substantially reduce market labor supply and provide much of the childcare. Grandparents’ help with childcare likely plays an important role in alleviating the motherhood effect. Suggestive evidence indicates that in return, grandparents who help with childcare receive more intra-family transfers and report higher subjective wellbeing. We further show that the motherhood effect, though relatively small, has increased substantially over the past decades. The rising gender gap in the labor market, the declining state sector that historically provides more flexible accommodations for working mothers, and the abolishment of the one-child policy all suggest a rising burden of motherhood on labor market outcomes.
The event will be webcast live from this page.
In this event on December 9 at 7 a.m. PT / 10 a.m. ET, the Stanford Center on China’s Economy and Institutions (SCCEI) and the CSIS Trustee Chair in Chinese Business and Economics present their latest Big Data China publication. The feature “Have U.S.-China Tensions Hurt American Innovation?” highlights the work of professors Ruixue Jia and Molly Roberts (University of California San Diego) and investigates the effects of U.S. policies toward China on academic collaboration between the two countries.
Trustee Chair Senior Fellow Ilaria Mazzocco will host the event, which will include an introduction by Professor Scott Rozelle of Stanford University. Professors Molly Roberts and Ruixue Jia of UC San Diego will discuss their research on the topic, followed by a discussion on the implications for U.S.-China relations and U.S. policy with distinguished panelists James Mulvenon of Peraton Labs, Deborah Seligsohn of Villanova University, and Abigail Coplin of Vassar College.
| Scott Rozelle Co-director at Stanford Center on China's Economy and Institutions | Molly Roberts Associate Professor of Political Science, UC San Diego |
| Ruixue Jia Associate Professor of Economics, UC San Diego | Abigail Coplin Assistant Professor of Sociology and Science, Technology and Society, Vassar College |
| James Mulvenon Scientific Research and Analysis, Peraton Labs | Ilaria Mazzocco Senior Fellow, Trustee Chair in Chinese Business and Economics |
| Deborah Seligsohn Senior Associate (Non-resident), Trustee Chair in Chinese Business and Economics | |
Virtual Livestream
China has witnessed rapid increases in the skill premium over the last few decades. In this paper, we study the short-run effect of capital goods imports on skill premium in China. The surge in capital goods imports, which embody advanced technology, can explain the rising demand for skill in China. We exploit regional variations in capital goods import exposure stemming from initial differences in import structure and instrument for the capital goods import growth using exchange rate movements. A city at the 75th percentile of the distribution of capital goods imports growth has a higher skill premium by 5 percentage points (0.38 standard deviation) over the one at the 25th percentile. To explore the underlying mechanism, we provide firm-level evidence and show that imported capital goods are skill-complementary.
