高铁如何影响劳动力流动:新视角与新证据

How does High-speed Rail Affect Labor Mobility:New Perspectives and New Evidence

研究交通基础设施如何影响劳动力流动是分析交通设施经济效益的必经过程。从迁移的视角,以城市便利性为中介因素,使用中国劳动力动态调查(CLDS)数据,结合条件Logit模型分析劳动力个体迁移决策过程,探讨高铁对劳动力流动的影响。研究发现:高铁能够通过提升城市便利性有效吸引劳动力流入,但存在区域异质性;高铁能够促使劳动力从小城市流向大城市,但并没有流向一、二线城市;城市高铁的这种吸引对高人力资本、家庭背景良好、对现状不满的年轻劳动力尤为有效。

In recent years,there have been a large number of literatures on the economic effects of high-speed rail in China.As a dedicated passenger line,high-speed railway produces economic effects mainly by influencing labor flow and then driving factor flow.However,there are still deficiencies about the analysis of high-speed rail effect on labor mobility in the existing studies,especially the lack of research on how high-speed rail affects labor migration.Different from short-term mobility such as labor travel and commuting,labor migration is a change in the place where the labor settles down,which has a more profound impact on urban economic development.This paper is different from previous studies on high-speed rail,which does not distinguish between short-term flow and migration.From the perspective of labor migration,this paper studies the impact of high-speed rail on labor migration by using the data of China Labor Dynamics Survey(CLDS)and conditional Logit model,and analyze the decision-making process of individual labor migration from the perspective of urban amenities.The research finds that:the opening of high-speed rail in a city can significantly improve the attractiveness of the city to the labor,and it is only effective for the labor living in cities without high-speed rail.The mechanism analysis shows that high-speed rail improves the urban amenities of urban residents,so it can enhance the attractiveness of cities to labor.The heterogeneity analysis of labor characteristics shows that the attraction of urban high-speed rail is particularly effective for the young labor force with high human capital,better family background and dissatisfaction with the current situation.Regional heterogeneity analysis finds that the attractiveness of high-speed rail in eastern developed regions to labor is significantly positive for both external and internal labor.High-speed rail in central China can only attract external labor.However,the high-speed rail cities in western China can not only attract the labor from external the region,but also promote the outflow of labor to other cities in the region.Although high-speed rail has promoted the migration of labor to core cities,it is only in the peripheral cities,that is,low-grade cities flow to middle-grade cities.The main contributions of this paper are as follows:first,a new perspective.Existing studies mainly focus on the impact of high-speed rail on labor face-to-face short-term communication,while this paper focuses on the impact of high-speed rail on labor migration.This is an effective extension of existing research boundaries.Second,new mechanisms.This paper hypothesizes that high-speed rail improves urban amenities and thus increase the attractiveness of cities to labor,and carries out empirical tests.Third,new data,methods and evidence.Existing research are dominated by stock data,using panel regressions to analyze the problem.Such studies lack direct reflection of the microcosmic law of events.This study complements the existing research model by using the conditional Logit model method,based on the CLDS data,which reflects individual micro characteristics.New evidence details how high-speed rail,an emerging transport infrastructure,affects labor mobility.The paper bridges the gap in existing research on the relationship between high-speed rail and labor migration choices.The finds reveal how the self-migration decision of various characteristics of labor are affected by the opening of high-speed railway,which can provide reference for the talent policy of institutions at all levels and the migration choice of individual labor.