Effects of tourism on socio-economic well-being and its inter-regional convergence: Evidence from China's 291 cities

Big socio-economic well-being gap is common across countries and regions. This study examines the impact of tourism on socio-economic well-being and its convergence from a comprehensive and inter-regional convergence perspective. Using panel data of 291 cities during the period 2005–2019, we provide the comprehensive evaluation of socio-economic well-being at the city scale in China. Considering the dynamic characteristics of socio-economic well-being, we therefore estimate the impact using the system generalized method of moments. The result indicates that tourism significantly enhances local socio-economic well-being and is found to be robust. We also find the dominance of domestic tourism, the positive moderator effects of general budget expenditure, GDP per capita and urbanization, and a greater driving force in cities with higher socio-economic well-being. Since both β- and σ-convergence hold, we confirm the positive effect of tourism on the convergence of inter-regional socio-economic well-being. We emphasize policies support for tourism development in underdeveloped regions through fiscal expenditure, financial transfer payments, intellectual support, urbanization, and infrastructure construction. We suggest incorporating tourism into frameworks such as rural revitalization and regional coordinated development. We also recommend accelerating the expansion of tourism in underdeveloped regions and enhancing the quality of tourism in developed regions as spatial strategies, while emphasizing inter-regional tourism coordination and cooperation.