高房价降低了人口出生率吗？——基于新家庭经济学理论的分析

Does High Housing Price Discourage Birthrate in China? An Analysis Based on New Family Economics Theory

基于中国330个地/州级城市及4个直辖市所辖区/县2005—2012年的面板数据,本文采用差分GMM估计及利用住房限购这一外生冲击识别了房价对人口出生率的因果影响。研究发现,当期房价和滞后一期房价的上涨显著降低了人口出生率,估计结果表明,从2007年至2012年,单纯由房价上涨而减少的出生人口总计约641万,平均每年减少出生人口约107万,约使每年新出生人口降低了6.3%。进一步的分析发现,房价对人口出生率的负向影响并非是由于房价过高所致,而是由于房价上涨过快所致。本文利用2010年开始在部分城市实施的住房限购这一外生冲击,采用双重差分(DID)模型进行估计,结果显示,住房限购通过抑制房价过快上涨而对提高人口出生率产生了积极影响,住房限购使人口出生率提高了约1.6个千分点。基于微观调查数据的作用机理研究表明,房价上涨既推迟了生育进度也降低了总的生育意愿。因此,就促进人口生育而言,当前房地产调控政策应着力于稳定房价及居民对未来房价走势的预期,避免房价暴涨暴跌。

Using city level panel data from 2005 to 2012 in China,this paper studies the causal effect of housing price on birthrate by using difference GMM method and difference-indifference(DID)method.We find that current period housing price and lag one period housing price have a significantly negative effect on birthrate.Calculation by the estimation results shows that housing price rise have cut down 641 million new birth people from 2007 to 2012,which makes the new birth population decrease by 6.3%.Further studies show that it is not the housing price level but the housing price growth rate that discourages birthrate.Using housing purchase restriction policy as an exogenous shock to set up a difference-in-difference model,we find that the policy could improve birthrate by 1.6‰.Lastly,based on micro-data,we find that the growth of housing price not only postpones the progress of birth but also decreases total fertility rate.The policy implication is that current housing policy should focus on stabilizing housing price and people's expectation on housing price.