APL (Ajiken Power Lunch)

APL (Ajiken Power Lunch) is a lunchtime workshop open to public, including IDE staffs, visiting research fellows, IDEAS students, outside researchers and graduate students. This workshop provides a platform for presentation of any work in progress where we can discuss in either English or Japanese.

Those who would attend a seminar are asked to announce yourself to receptionists on your arrival at the IDE and to obtain APL Organizers' signature on your admission card after the seminar.

August 3, 2015. (Monday) 12：30-14：00

Institute of Developing Economies, Japan External Trade Organization C23 Meeting Room 　

Do Place-Based Policies Work? Micro-Level Evidence from China's Economic Zones Program

This paper examines the impact of a prominent place-based program in China -- the Economic Zones program on economic activity of the targeted areas. To do so, we exploit two geo-coded comprehensive waves of Chinese firm censuses, which allow the construction of a panel dataset for areas before and after the zone establishment. By pairing areas across zone boundaries, we find that, first, the economic zones have a positive effect on the employment, output and capital of the targeted area. The program has also increased the number of firms located in the zones. Second, the extensive margin (firm births and deaths) plays a larger role in explaining the SEZ effect than the intensive margin (incumbents). Finally, the zones' effectiveness depends on program features. Across sectors, for firms in more capital-intensive sectors, the zones exhibit larger positive impacts on firm performance than those in more labor-intensive sectors. Meanwhile, location characteristics such as market potential and transportation accessibility are not critical factors in enhancing the program effects.

more information:
http://ylu6.weebly.com/

Dr. Yi Lu (Associate Professor, Department of Economics, National University of Singapore)

Hitoshi SATO

English