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Combating Cross-Border Externalities

Shiyi Chen, Joshua Graff-Zivin, Huanhuan Wang, Jiaxin Xiong, Sep 21, 2022

China implemented a pioneering policy in 2011, the Ecological Compensation Initiative (ECI), which establishes side payments between upstream and downstream provinces in the Xin’an River Basin.

China’s Rebalancing and Gender Inequality

Mariya Brussevich, Era Dabla-Norris, Bin Grace Li, Jun 23, 2021

This study documents women’s declining relative wages and labor force participation in China over the last two decades, in contrast with the predictions of the structural transformation literature, suggesting that rising service sector share is associated with narrowing gender gaps. We show that women’s labor supply elasticity to spouse’s wages increased dramatically between 1995 and 2013, which is consistent with a U-shaped relationship between economic development and women’s...

Do CEOs Know Best? Evidence from China

Nicholas Bloom, Hong Cheng, Mark Duggan, Hongbin Li, Franklin Qian, Jan 30, 2019

Using data from the China Employer-Employee Survey (CEES), a recent survey of Chinese manufacturing firms, we analyze the extent to which employees of differing levels are able to assess their firms’ management practices. Our study finds that of CEOs, managers, and workers, CEOs tend to have the most accurate appraisals of their firms. Additionally, we find that firms with higher levels of disagreement...

Growing like China: Firm Performance and GVC Position

Davin Chor, Kalina Manova, Zhihong Yu, Apr 14, 2021

We use firm-level customs and manufacturing survey data, together with Input-Output tables for China, to examine how Chinese firms position themselves in global production lines. We document a sharp rise in the upstreamness of China’s imports, while the positioning of its exports has remained relatively stable, over the 1992-2014 period. Participation in global value chains thus appears to have facilitated an...

The Unintended Consequences of Regulation: Evidence from China’s Interbank Market

Xian Gu, Lu Yun, Jun 12, 2019

Financial regulation can have unanticipated consequences in the financial system. The evidence from China’s interbank market shows that banks tend to use newly introduced and lightly regulated financial instruments to get around regulation during their search for funds. Banks facing greater competition or higher liquidity shortages have more incentives to engage in such activities. Such interbank activities are closely associated with banks’ proprietary trading, suggesting the potential risk of financial contagion.