数字政务与城市公共服务效率--基于政务APP的准自然实验

Digital government and urban efficiency of public sectors:A quasi-natural experiment based on government service APPs

利用2003—2019年中国地级市面板数据,采用控制方程法测度城市公共服务效率。基于“政务APP”推广的政策视角,构建时间异质性双重差分模型、广义双重差分模型和事件分析模型,以评估政务APP推广对于城市公共服务效率的影响。研究发现:推广政务APP能够提升地级市政府的公共服务效率,该结果通过了地区异质性、事件分析法和安慰剂检验。推广政务APP能够产生中介效应,即提升政府透明度和市场化程度,进而改善城市政务的公共服务效率。此外,其还能产生均等化效应,即缩小城市之间公共服务效率的差距。建议进一步完善政务APP的功能属性,促进政务APP与政府及企业的融合,着力推广国家级政务APP平台。

Using the city-level panel data of China from 2003 to 2019, this paper estimated the efficiency of city governments by using the control function approach. Then the paper uses the heterogeneous timing DID model, the generalized DID model and the event study to evaluate the impact of the government service APPs on the efficiency of city public services, the intermediate effects and the equalization effects between the two variables. The government service APPs can benefit the efficiency of public services, and this result has passed several robustness checks including the district heterogeneous test, event study and Placebo Test. The government service APPs can generate intermediate effects, which increase government transparency and market indexes, and then improve the efficiency of the government’s public services. The government service APP can generate equalization effects, which narrows the public service efficiency gap across cities. This paper suggests that governments upgrade the system of government Service APPs, integrate government service APPs with government sectors and firms, and promote the country-level government service APP.