电子商务发展的创业效应:来自微观家庭数据的证据

Effects of E-commerce Development on Entrepreneurship:Evidence from Microdata of Households

创业是促进家庭财富积累和经济高质量发展的重要途径。本文基于区县电商发展大数据和中国家庭金融调查数据,研究电子商务发展对家庭创业的整体影响、结构效应和作用机制。采用历史时期的信息网络干线建设构造电子商务的工具变量,本文发现地区电商发展水平显著促进了家庭创业。区分线上和线下创业来看,电子商务促进了线上创业,对线下创业则同时存在“带动效应”和“替代效应”:电子商务对制造业以及交通运输、仓储和邮政业等行业的线下创业有促进作用,对批发和零售行业的线下创业具有替代作用。分区域看,电子商务能够带动农村地区的线下创业,对城镇地区的线下创业则没有显著影响。电子商务也促进了线上线下融合创业,且电商发展水平越高,线上带动线下形成融合创业的效应越强。就影响机制而言,电商发展弥补了信息、资金等创业资源供给的不足,也通过激发市场需求提供了更多创业进入机会。

In China,e-commerce is developing rapidly,driving a large number of households to become grassroots entrepreneurs"at low cost.However,the impact of e-commerce on offline entrepreneurial activities is still controversial.This paper uses the e-commerce development database provided by Alibaba to construct the county-level ecommerce development index,matches them with the household business tracking data from the China Household Finance Survey,and finds that e-commerce development tsignificantlypromotes household entrepreneurship.E-commerce promotes offline entrepreneurshiipn manufacturing,transportation,warehousing,and postal industries,but reduces it in wholesale and retail industries.By region,e-commerce can drive offline entrepreneurship in rural areas,but has no significant impact in urban areas.E-commerce also promotes the integration of online and offline entrepreneurship.E-commerce not only satisfies the supply of resources for household entrepreneurship by increasing attention to business information and willingness to take risks and alleviating credit constraints,but also enhances household entrepreneurial intentions through expanding consumer markets.The possible marginal contributions of this paper are threfold.First,this paper complements the empirical evidence on the impact of digital technology on entrepreneurship from the perspective of e-commerce,which enriches the effects on entrepreneurship in the research of digital economy.Second,this paper further examines how households enter different entrepreneurial markets in the e-commerce environment and how online and offline entrepreneurship interact,enriching relevant research on the impact of e-commerce on enterprises and market changes.Third,this paper further adds the role of demand-side factors such as consumer market expansion in the effect of e-commerce on entrepreneurship,which helps to understand more deeply the role of demand in creating supply and driving economic growth.This paper explores the overall impact of e-commerce on entrepreneurship,the structural effect on online and offline entrepreneurship and the mechanism on supply and demand sides.It provides empirical evidence and policy recommendations for further promoting e-commerce development,guiding offline businesses to actively participate in digital transformation and realizing online-offline integrated operation,etc.In the future,we can further expand the research on the impact of e-commerce on entrepreneurship quality,entrepreneurial performance,and the growth and development of small and medium-sized enterprises.