县域创业活动、农民增收与共同富裕——基于中国县级数据的实证研究

County-level Entrepreneurship,Farmers'Income Increase and Common Prosperity:An Empirical Study Based on Chinese County-level Data

共同富裕是中国特色社会主义的根本原则,是全体人民为之奋斗的目标和矢志不渝的追求。在我国,农村人口占低收入群体的比例较高,并且农民收入普遍偏低。在此背景下,提升农民收入是实现共同富裕的基础条件和物质保障。本文利用2000—2017年中国1749个县级行政区的数据,对县域创业活动与农村居民可支配收入的关系进行了实证分析。研究发现,首先,县域创业有利于农民增收,特别表现为小微型及公司制的创业活动。进一步研究发现,县域创业有利于缩小城乡收入差距。此外,政府规模对创业的减贫效果具有“倒U型”的调节作用,这一作用主要体现在中西部地区。本文通过进一步分析县域之间在基础设施建设和数字经济建设方面的特征差异,发现在未开通高铁的县域和非电子商务示范县域,县域创业与政府规模的共同作用更加明显。最后,本文结合案例分析,进一步探索了特定区域的特色化创业增收道路,为提升农民收入提供了可行路径。

Common prosperity,the fundamental principle of socialism with Chinese characteristics,is seen as the ultimate goal and unswerving pursuit of the whole nation.In China,where rural residents take up a large proportion of the low-income population with the fact that farmers are generally underpaid,it is imperative to increase their income which serves as the basic requirement and material guarantee for attaining the objective.Given the experiences along this arduous march,entrepreneurship,by every means a significance for poverty reduction,boosted economic growth,technological development and social progress.So,whether it is still applicable to county areas,where critical for tackling Three Rural Issues(of agriculture,rural areas and rural people)and for rural vitalization in China,is worth analyzing.In addition,based on the reality that the Chinese government is a central player in all aspects of society,the literature has pointed out its importance in the past,especially given the relationship between entrepreneurship and regional development.In rural areas,the role is way much prominent,with the local government's promotion and guidance being the cornerstone of rural revitalization and the leading force in boosting the county's economy.On account of the analysis above and the existing research,an empirical analysis has been conducted on the relationship between county-level entrepreneurship and rural residents'disposable income,after applying unbalanced panel data on 1,749 county-level administrative regions in China from 2000-2017.Having mitigating the endogeneity by two-stage least squares(2SLS),the study found that:(1)county-level entrepreneurship is conducive to increasing farmers'incomes which can be manifested in entrepreneurial activities of all kinds,especially in those of small and micro enterprises and corporate enterprises.With promotion of employment and industries served as two important mechanisms,it also helps narrow the income gap between urban and rural areas.(2)the size of government determines an“inverted U-shaped”moderating effect on the level of poverty alleviation by entrepreneurship.If the size is originally on a small scale,the effect of poverty alleviation by entrepreneurship increases as it expands.However,the expansion would reduce the effect once the size reaches a certain level.(3)the role of entrepreneurship and government is markedly heterogeneous.Entrepreneurial activity exerts a more significant effect on local farmers'incomes in the central and western counties,as well as in counties without high-speed rail and e-commerce demonstration programme,both of which show a more pronounced degree of combined effect of county-level entrepreneurship and government size.The paper contributes in three aspects:(1)It confirms the fact with macro-level county data that entrepreneurial activity boosts poverty reduction while narrowing income cap between urban and rural areas and clarifies the different effects of specific entrepreneurial activities in terms of their size,type and sector on farmers'incomes.In addition,it further explores the important mechanisms through which county entrepreneurial activities play an income-generating role.All of the results above enrich the literature on regional entrepreneurship and provide theoretical implication for poverty alleviation,income growth and common prosperity in rural China.(2)It identifies the joint role of entrepreneurship and government in promoting income growth among rural residents.With tests for heterogeneity across different types of counties,the findings reveal that the role is more pronounced in less developed regions,suggesting that county-level entrepreneurship boosting income growth is to some extent a‘universal'path to prosperity,and that the more underdeveloped a region is,the more crucial the role of government undertakes.These push forward the research on the role of government in entrepreneurship and render insights into the role of entrepreneurship and government.(3)It probes the distinctive entrepreneurial paths of specific regions for income growth based on case studies,setting a more concrete research context for a deeper understanding of the relationship between entrepreneurship and common prosperity,as well as providing referable theoretical findings for the relationship between government and the market.