人力资本扩张与中国技能偏向型技术进步——基于高校扩招的准自然实验

Human Capital Expansion and Skill-biased Technological Change in China:Quasi-natural Experiment Based on College Enlarging Enrollment

本文利用中国高校扩招这一外生性政策冲击,构造准自然实验,采用双重差分法,系统评估了人力资本扩张对中国技能偏向型技术进步的影响效应与机理。研究发现,中国高校扩招所引致的人力资本扩张,有效地推动了中国技能偏向型技术进步,且其内在机制在于,人力资本扩张显著地提升了城市高技能劳动力供给,从而使得技术进步朝着丰富要素的方向发展,推动了技能偏向型技术进步。研究还发现,人力资本扩张对中国技能偏向型技术进步的影响存在显著的区域异质性,且在受高校毕业生冲击较大、人力资本与科研投入匹配度较高以及市场化程度较高的地区,这一影响更为明显。本文结论为深刻理解人力资本扩张的技术进步效应,进而为促进中国经济发展提供政策启示。

This paper regards the exogenous policy of college enlarging enrollment in China in 1999 as a quasi-natural experiment,and systematically evaluates the effect and mechanism of human capital expansion on skill-biased technological progress,based on the difference-in-difference model.The research results show that the human capital expansion due to the college enlarging enrollment effectively promoted the skill-biased technological change in China and its internal mechanism is that the expansion of human capital has significantly increased the supply of highly skilled labor in cities,so as to make the technological change toward the direction of rich elements.Furthermore,the study finds that the influence of human capital expansion on skill-biased technological change in China has significant regional heterogeneity,and the influence is more obvious in regions that are heavily impacted by college graduates,have higher matching degree of human capital and research investment,and have higher degree of marketization.The conclusions of this paper provide policy inspiration for understanding the technological change effect of human capital expansion and promoting the high-quality development of China's economy.