Abstract:  How to allocate college seats spatially is an important yet largely neglected issue. It entails a policy tradeoff between efficiency in aggregate human capital production and equality of college opportunities across regions. Furthermore, because the spatial allocation of college seats assigns students to a college location, the resulting flow of attendance also influences the spatial distribution of skilled workers through post-college migration. This paper quantifies such tradeoff between efficiency and multidimensional inequality by analyzing the province-based college admission quotas in China. Combining national administrative data and surveys, I estimate a dynamic model of college and migration choice under spatial quota constraints. I find substantial gaps in pre-college human capital among college applicants across provinces, while this disparity is not well reflected in the allocated admission quotas. A purely merit-based nationwide admission increases aggregate human capital at the cost of worse opportunities and substantially more severe brain drain in less developed regions. Comparing the current spatial quotas in China against the efficiency-equality frontier implies a large policy weight toward a more equalized spatial supply of skilled labor.

Abstract:  Over the past four decades, the earnings gap between college graduates and non-graduates has widened substantially, prompting interest in policies aimed at promoting higher education among low-income students. A key challenge for these policies is the high college dropout rate. This paper develops a dynamic model of college enrollment and completion with rich individual heterogeneity to assess how various factors influence college dropout and graduation. We estimate the model using data from longitudinal surveys, meta-analyses, and large-scale randomized controlled trials. We use the model to simulate the effects of tuition subsidies, college loans, financial incentives, and increased pre-college skills on attendance and completion. We find moderate effects of most unconditional financial policies on attendance, with very small effects on completion conditional on attendance. In contrast, forgiving student loans upon receipt of a bachelor's degree substantially raises completion conditional on enrollment. Tuition subsidies tend to accrue to students from relatively wealthy backgrounds who would have graduated from a four-year college regardless. We find that the greatest potential could come from better preparing students for college if one could figure out a way to operationalize this.

Abstract: Observable scalar rankings compress complex information and guide allocation decisions, yet they are often treated as portable summaries of behavior across environments. This paper develops a diagnostic framework for evaluating when rankings transported across environments fail, covering both who matches with whom and the outcomes those matches produce. We implement the framework using a randomized online-dating experiment that independently varies male height and income, and transport search-stage rankings to nationally representative Chinese marriage data.

Media coverage:  VoxChina

Abstract:  Marriage and fertility are declining globally. We study how the interaction between demographic changes and spatial sorting affects marriage matching across space and quantify its aggregate implications for national marriage rates. Using data from China, we first present stylized facts on the joint patterns of dramatic gender-biased spatial demographic changes, persistent marital social norms, and the diverging spatial distribution of singlehood characterized by a high singles rate for females (males) in more (less) developed cities. We then build a prefecture-level spatial equilibrium model with multi-sector and multi-skill production, migration, and local marriage markets. The model reveals that, without gender-specific spatial demographic changes, the singles rate would be 30% lower for women on average and over 50% lower for college-educated women. The key mechanism is that more highly educated women sort into the service sector in more developed cities than men. However, social norms remain persistent, particularly the strong preference for hypergamy. This results in more failed marriage matches for females (males) in more (less) developed cities, thereby lowering the national marriage rate. Counterfactual analysis shows that subsidizing marriage is costly and relatively ineffective amid continued gender-specific spatial demographic changes.

Abstract: Low fertility presents a major challenge for many nations. We study whether restricting competition-driven private tutoring can enhance fertility intentions by analysing China’s 2021 private tutoring ban. Using nationwide surveys, we elicit respondents’ fertility intentions under scenarios with and without the policy. The tutoring ban significantly increases expected total fertility by 7%–8%, with larger effects in cities under greater policy intensity. Decomposition reveals that the primary driver is perceived reduction in educational competition, followed by improved parental health, parent-child relationships, and reduced time and monetary costs. We also find consistent results on actual birth rates three years after the policy.

Abstract: Reports of the difficulties of elite women in finding suitable mates have been increasing despite the growing availability and value of men in China. We rationalize this “leftover women” phenomenon within the directed/competitive search framework, which uniquely allows for equilibrium crowding out. Within this framework, we show that the leftover women phenomenon can be the result of women’s aversion to men who have a lower income than themselves (hereafter, ALM) and the long-predicted complementarity between women’s non-market traits (in particular, beauty) and male earnings. For high-income (h-)women, even when high-income (H-)men are more plentiful and richer, the direct effect of the greater number of desirable men can be overwhelmed by the indirect effect of competitive ‘entry’ by low-income (l-)women, particularly, the beautiful. We test for these competitive search effects using online dating field experimental, Census, and household survey data. Consistent with the competitive entry of l-women, when sex ratio and H-men’s income increase, the search intensity of beautiful l-women for H-men increases. In response to this competitive entry, plain h-women, who are constrained by their ALM to search predominantly for H-men, also increase the search intensity. However, only their marriage probability decreases. Our evidence is consistent with intra-female competitive search for spouses who can cover the labor market opportunity cost of marriage and childbirth, which increases with a woman’s income.

Abstract: Many prior studies suggest that default alphabetical ordering of coauthors in economics confers disproportionate professional advantages on those with an early surname initial because of the greater prominence it gives to the first author. However, these studies do not consider that authors select into coauthorships according to the incentives identified. We develop a model of endogenous selection into single and coauthorships around the principle that no one wants to be second author when they expect to provide the larger contribution (i.e., are of higher “quality”). We test it with authorship data from economics, with management (which does not use default alphabetical ordering) as a benchmark. We predict for economics that lower quality authors with an early surname initial would be less desirable coauthors, whereas higher quality authors with a late initial would have a lower desire to coauthor. Most desired are early initial authors of high quality, who are therefore advantaged in forming high-quality collaborations. The combined effect predicts citation rank increases with surname initial for single-authored papers and decreases for coauthored. We find both effects for economics when compared to management and absolutely. Our findings indicate that part of the advantage enjoyed by early surname initial authors in economics could be due to the higher ability among them having more incentive-compatible collaborators, rather than merely to greater prominence.

摘要: 随着科技的迅速发展和中国人口结构的变化，人才的作用在经济和社会发展中日益凸显。过去十年间，多个城市在放开户籍限制后相继进一步出台了大规模的人才引进政策。本文基于人才补贴政策的视角，对中国城市间“人才大战”的发展历程、时间和空间的特征事实、地方政府间的策略竞争互动进行了系统性研究。本文首先通过对全国各地级市出台的人才政策文件的全面搜集，构建了各地级市在2008—2019年间的人才补贴指数。研究发现，中国各地级市的人才引进政策，在时间上呈现出明显的阶段性爆发特征，在空间上则表现出由东向西梯度递减的格局，并与各城市的经济发展水平呈显著的倒U形关系。此外，地级市政府在人才引进政策的制定中存在显著的同群效应，即城市的人才补贴强度受到其潜在竞争城市政策的显著正向影响，这为“晋升锦标赛”驱动地方政府间策略性互动的理论提供了证据参考。最后，本文对研究人才引进政策影响的文献进行了系统回顾并展望了未来的研究方向。

Abstract: As technological progress accelerates and China's demographic structure shifts, human capital has taken on an increasingly central role in economic and social development. Over the past decade, a large number of Chinese cities have followed the relaxation of hukou restrictions with sizable talent attraction policies of their own. This paper provides a systematic study of the resulting talent competition among Chinese cities through the lens of talent subsidy policies, documenting its historical development, its temporal and spatial stylized facts, and the strategic competitive interaction among local governments. We first conduct a comprehensive collection of talent policy documents issued by prefecture-level cities nationwide and construct a city-level talent subsidy index covering the period 2008 to 2019. We find that talent attraction policies across Chinese cities exhibit a pronounced pattern of episodic, phased acceleration over time, a clear east-to-west declining gradient in space, and a significant inverted U relationship with the level of local economic development. We further document a significant peer effect in policymaking at the prefecture level: a city's talent subsidy intensity responds positively to the policies of its potential competitor cities. This finding provides empirical support for the promotion tournament theory of strategic interaction among Chinese local governments. The paper closes with a systematic review of the literature on the effects of talent attraction policies and a discussion of directions for future research.

摘要: 县域高中发展困境是区域发展不平衡在教育领域的直接体现。本文利用全国县级教育财政微观行政数据，借助Bartik形式的政策冲击变量，使用户籍政策放宽的外生冲击，考察人口流动对于县域高中发展的影响。我们发现，潜在人口流入地的户籍放宽减少了流出地县中经费支出和收入。机制检验表明，劳动力区域间再配置与地方财政收支变化是县中经费收支变化的重要原因。进一步分析发现，县中经费收支变化也导致了师资和生源流失，师生流失一方面是潜在人口流入地户籍放宽促进人口流动的直接结果，另一方面也是财政差距拉大导致教育质量相对下降的后果。本文表明，城镇化进程中政府应适当保护人口流出地教育机会，更好地推动教育公平，实现共同富裕。

Abstract: The reform of China’s household registration (hukou) system plays a pivotal role in shaping urbanisation, significantly contributing to the acceleration of urbanization and the reallocation of public resources ‒ particularly in education. Against this backdrop of deepening urbanisation, achieving balanced educational resource distribution and fostering high-quality education have become imperative. These goals are critical not only for advancing educational equity and optimising financial allocations but also for ensuring sustainable development of rural high schools and narrowing regional disparities in education quality. This paper utilizes nationwide micro-level administrative data on education finance and exogenous changes in Hukou policies to examine the impact of migration on the development of rural high schools. Results demonstrate that relaxed hukou restrictions in destination cities reduce both expenditures and revenues for county-level schools in outflow areas. These financial adjustments stem primarily from interregional labour reallocation and constrained local fiscal budgets. Further analysis reveals that deteriorating school finances trigger a loss of local teachers and students ‒ a dual consequence of outmigration (directly driven by hukou liberalisation) and declining educational quality (amplified by fiscal disparities). This dynamic traps rural schools in a self-perpetuating cycle of educational disadvantage.

摘要: 本文研究2021年实施的教育“双减”政策对中小学校内外负担、家庭教育支出以及身心健康等的影响。基于在全国范围内针对“双减”政策开展的家庭微观调查数据，我们发现学生的学习负担在“双减”政策实施后显著减少了四分之一，家庭教育支出及家长的时间投入降低了约15%，学生和家长的多项身心健康指标也得到了显著改善。异质性分析发现，家长具有本科及以下学历的家庭在教育投入上的降幅相对更大，而这些学生和家长在身心健康方面的获益也更多。进一步的机制探索发现，家长在认知和信念上的差异影响了其实际的教育投入。