Journal of Asian Economics最新文献

{"title":"Does government-driven infrastructure boost green innovation? Evidence of new infrastructure plan in China","authors":"","doi":"10.1016/j.asieco.2024.101828","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.asieco.2024.101828","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>The role of government-driven investment in improving environmental quality has long been an essential concern of environmental research. Using a spatial difference-in-differences model, this study investigates the influence of government-driven new infrastructure investment on green innovation. Based on a panel dataset of 276 Chinese cities from 2005 to 2019, we find a positive effect of high-speed rail (HSR) and smart city (SC) construction on green innovation. Compared with cities that are unconnected to the HSR network, those that are accessible by HSR experienced a 20.6 % increase in per capita green patents. In addition, being a SC planned by the government is associated with 14.8 % more green patents per capita than other cities. Moreover, government-promoted new infrastructure has significant spatial spillover effects on green innovation in adjacent cities. Regional sensitivity is found in promotional and spatial spillover effects. The findings of our study offer essential insights for developing effective policies for advancing infrastructure modernization and environmental protection simultaneously.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":47583,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Asian Economics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":2.9,"publicationDate":"2024-10-11","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142433315","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Inflation targeting and monetary policy response in India","authors":"","doi":"10.1016/j.asieco.2024.101822","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.asieco.2024.101822","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>India adopted the Flexible Inflation Targeting (FIT) regime in 2016 under the mentorship of the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC). With FIT’s introduction, the effectiveness of monetary policy transmission channels required a re-visit and this paper is a valuable contribution in this direction. Using the multivariate model with an augmented Bayesian set- up, we find that FIT-MPC has strengthened the credit and interest rate channels while their impact on output has weakened. The impact of Operation Twist – a set of unconventional measures pursued during the pandemic is visible. Overall, the findings highlight the overhauling effect of monetary policy transmission in the Indian context.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":47583,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Asian Economics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":2.9,"publicationDate":"2024-10-11","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142444966","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Confucian culture, public education expenditure, and economic growth","authors":"","doi":"10.1016/j.asieco.2024.101827","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.asieco.2024.101827","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Confucian culture has been found to have significant effects on economic outcomes, yet current studies seldom delve into its impact on regional economic growth in China and the role of government behavior as a mechanism. From the perspective of government response to public demands for education, this paper examines whether Confucian culture fosters economic growth by driving up public education expenditure. Using panel data at the prefecture-level over 2003–2018 and taking the historical population density of <em>jinshi</em> in the Ming and Qing Dynasties as the proxy of the Confucian culture, the empirical analysis is done mainly through pooled OLS and IV analysis. Results show that Confucian culture has a significant and positive effect on economic growth, which can be partially explained by its positive influence on public education expenditure. The channel still holds after controlling human capital in regression. Further discussion of the clan culture and local governors’ cultural backgrounds suggests that higher public education expenditure results from the local government’s passive response to public demands for education. Thus, local governments are suggested to widen and improve the channels for expressing public demands and increase public education expenditure while balancing public demands and the need to boost economic growth.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":47583,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Asian Economics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":2.9,"publicationDate":"2024-10-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142444964","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"The impact of digitization in manufacturing on female employment and gender wage gap","authors":"","doi":"10.1016/j.asieco.2024.101821","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.asieco.2024.101821","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>This paper comprehensively examines the impact of digitization in manufacturing on female employment and the gender wage gap, utilizing data from Chinese manufacturing enterprises. The findings indicate that digitization creates more employment opportunities for female workers, increases their employment share, and narrows the gender wage gap. Notably, the increase in female employment due to digitization is more pronounced in private enterprises, as well as in the eastern and central regions, particularly within low-tech industries. Similarly, the effect of digitization on reducing the gender wage gap is most significant in private enterprises, eastern regions, and low-tech sectors. The mechanism underlying these changes suggests that manufacturing digitization enhances female employment through increased output and productivity, thereby contributing to a reduction in the gender wage gap. This study holds significant value for advancing digitization and promoting gender equality in the labor market.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":47583,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Asian Economics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":2.9,"publicationDate":"2024-10-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142422123","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Data policy restrictions and cross-border E-commerce: Evidence from China","authors":"","doi":"10.1016/j.asieco.2024.101826","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.asieco.2024.101826","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>In the era of digital economics, data has become a crucial factor in driving cross-border e-commerce (CBEC). We examine the impact of data policy restrictions on CBEC, focusing on the Chinese context. Using a theoretical framework that analyzes the costs and benefits of data protection regulations, we delve into the economic effects of these policies. The results show that data policies in importing countries have a substantial negative impact on China’s CBEC exports. The heterogeneous analysis shows that this negative impact is stronger for products that are more differentiated, industries that are more highly-digital and high-tech, and countries with higher income. We also estimate the moderating role of data comparative advantage. The results reveal that the trade-inhibiting effect of data restriction increases with the enhancement of importing countries’ data comparative advantage. Finally, economic freedom in the importing country can mitigate the negative impact of data policy restrictions.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":47583,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Asian Economics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":2.9,"publicationDate":"2024-10-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142533821","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"International comparison of the impact of digital transformation on employment","authors":"","doi":"10.1016/j.asieco.2024.101820","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.asieco.2024.101820","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Theoretical analysis in this paper examines the impact of digital transformation on employment and its transmission mechanisms. It proposes that regional characteristics, such as market size, industry structure, and labor structure, are important factors influencing the employment effect of digital transformation. Empirically, this paper analyzes the employment effect of digital transformation using economic panel data from 68 countries spanning the years 2013–2019 and finds that: 1) In terms of employment, digital transformation is dominated by the substitution effect. In terms of wages, digital transformation presents wage-rising effects. 2) Large market size and advanced industry structure significantly mitigate the employment substitution effect and enhance the wage-rising effect. 3) The skillization of labor structure has no significant impact on the employment substitution effect of digital transformation, but it significantly enhances the wage-raising effect. 4) Developing countries experience a more pronounced employment substitution effect from digital transformation, while developed countries witness a more prominent wage-increasing effect. The robustness of these results has been confirmed after introducing a one-period lag in the explanatory variables and utilizing instrumental variables. These findings of this paper offer valuable insights for achieving a balance between equity and efficiency in the context of digital transformation.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":47583,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Asian Economics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":2.9,"publicationDate":"2024-10-06","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142553409","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Food inflation and monetary policy in emerging economies","authors":"","doi":"10.1016/j.asieco.2024.101817","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.asieco.2024.101817","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>The rising inflationary pressure has been linked with supply-side disruptions and rising energy and food prices against the background of the COVID-19 pandemic and the Russia-Ukraine crisis. This paper investigates the role of monetary policy in stabilizing food inflation in emerging economies (India, China, Brazil, Russia, and South Africa). We also investigate the causal linkage between monetary policy and food inflation using frequency domain-based Granger causality and find strong feedback causal effects between food inflation and monetary policy changes. Our results are robust to different estimation methodologies, possible asymmetry, and alternative model specifications, which include climate change. While oil prices, world food prices, and exchange rates have heterogeneous effects on domestic food inflation, a contractionary monetary policy stance leads to a decline in domestic food inflation in all countries. Thus, we provide strong evidence that well-coordinated macroeconomic policies in emerging economies are essential for stabilizing food inflation.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":47583,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Asian Economics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":2.9,"publicationDate":"2024-10-05","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142533791","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Labour rights protection and export expansion: Evidence from SA8000 certification","authors":"","doi":"10.1016/j.asieco.2024.101816","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.asieco.2024.101816","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Protecting labour rights is an important approach to shaping the new advantages of trade competition and achieving high-quality development of China’s export trade. This paper considers SA8000 certification as the criterion for labour rights protection and manually collects information from firms certified by the National Certification and Accreditation Administration of China. Next, we investigate the effects of SA8000 certification on firm exports. The results show that SA8000 certification significantly expands the export scale while improving export quality. The mechanism analysis shows that the improvement effects are achieved in three ways: reducing operating costs, improving social reputation and increasing labour efficiency. Moreover, the positive effects of SA8000 certification are more profound for resource-intensive firms, non-state-owned firms and large firms. Our study provides an important reference for safeguarding labour rights and reconstructing new competitive advantages in exports.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":47583,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Asian Economics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":2.9,"publicationDate":"2024-10-05","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142422212","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"The haze reduction effect in china under the digital economy","authors":"","doi":"10.1016/j.asieco.2024.101819","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.asieco.2024.101819","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Haze pollution is becoming increasingly serious as it endangers human health and pressurizes economic development. This study incorporates the digital economy and haze pollution management into a unified research framework, and uses the panel data of 285 cities in China from 2011 to 2020 to precisely identify the haze reduction effect of the digital economy, governance mechanisms, and the non-linear and spatial spillover characteristics of the haze reduction effect in China. The findings demonstrate that: First, the digital economy can significantly reduce haze pollution, and this conclusion still holds after considering endogeneity and other robustness tests. Second, the digital economy can inhibit haze pollution by promoting industrial upgrading and improving total factor energy efficiency, and there is a chain mechanism of “industrial green transformation → total factor energy efficiency” and “factor market distortion → total factor energy efficiency.” However, the haze reduction mechanism of digital economy is heterogeneous to cities with different levels of economic development. Independent transmission mechanism plays a complete intermediary role in cities with low level of economic development, while it plays a partial intermediary role in cities with high level of economic development. Chain transmission mechanism only has an impact on cities with high level of economic development. Third, there is an evident threshold effect on the digital economy, and its haze reduction effect has N-type non-linear characteristics. Meanwhile, Digital economy has threshold effect on the mechanism of restraining haze pollution through total factor energy efficiency, industrial green transformation and factor market distortion. With the development of total factor energy efficiency, industrial green transformation and the reduction of factor market distortion, the haze reduction effect of digital economy can produce a qualitative leap. Fourth, Haze pollution in the spatial, temporal, and spatial dimensions has spillover and warning effects, and the haze reduction effect of digital economy shows strong positive externalities. Therefore, the digital economy should be actively developed, and industrial green transformation and factor market reform should be promoted to curb haze pollution by promoting industrial upgrading, improving energy efficiency and strengthening regional joint prevention and control mechanisms.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":47583,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Asian Economics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":2.9,"publicationDate":"2024-10-05","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142422122","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Possible development path for agricultural economic and trade cooperation in FTAAP: A numerical simulation","authors":"","doi":"10.1016/j.asieco.2024.101818","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.asieco.2024.101818","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Exploring the path of developing agricultural economy and trade cooperation in the Free Trade Area of the Asia Pacific (FTAAP) is of great practical significance for deepening economic integration in the Asia Pacific region and strengthening regional agricultural development. This paper proposes three feasible paths based on RCEP, CPTPP, and the integration of RCEP and CPTPP to establish FTAAP. Moreover, a dynamic computable general equilibrium model of global trade is used to simulate the macroeconomic effects and the agricultural effects represented by China in forming FTAAP under these three paths. The research results show that six common policy nodes will promote macroeconomic growth in participating countries, and the effects of the in-depth implementation of RCEP and CPTPP will be greater than those of the initial implementation. Due to the broader base of participating economies and the higher level of openness, establishing FTAAP under Path 3 will yield greater macroeconomic effects and agricultural effects. Therefore, the path based on the integration of RCEP and CPTPP is an optimal selection for economic and trade cooperation of agriculture in FTAAP. All parties should actively overcome the obstacles to forming FTAAP and provide a stable internal and external industrial development environment for regional agricultural economic and trade cooperation.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":47583,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Asian Economics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":2.9,"publicationDate":"2024-10-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142422213","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}