中国式现代化视域下数字经济的共同富裕效应:方法与证据

Common Prosperity Effect of the Digital Economy in the Context of Chinese Modernization:Methods and Evidence

本文构建了一个度量和分析共同富裕效应的研究框架,并基于中国家庭收入调查(CHIP)和城市层面数据,估算了数字经济对共同富裕的影响。研究发现:(1)数字经济有显著的增长效应,其作用机制是促进创新和提高生产效率,而非延长工作时间;(2)静态上,数字经济是收入不均等的重要来源,对不同收入水平群体之间、城乡群体之间、不同教育水平群体之间的收入差距的贡献为正;(3)动态上,随着数字经济的发展,其不均等效应逐渐减弱,即分配效应有所增强,同时增长效应持续显著。因此从整体上来看,数字经济的发展有助于促进共同富裕的实现。基于上述发现,本文建议进一步发展数字经济,在发展中逐步缩小并消除数字鸿沟,以此助力共同富裕目标的达成。

Achieving common prosperity for all has always been an unwavering pursuit of the Chinese government and society. Prior to the reform and opening-up era, the distribution tended to be characterized by “common” rather than “prosperity,” and it could even be said that this “common” hindered “prosperity”. The reform and opening-up policy of “letting some people get rich first” has achieved China's economic miracle and continuously improved the living standards of the people. However, the wealth gap has continued to widen. It can be said that while progress has been made in prosperity, “common” has not been fully achieved, and thus there is still a considerable distance to go for common prosperity in China. How to balance or even make choices between “common” and “prosperity”, the relationship between “having one's cake and eating it too”, is a major challenge that governments, societies, and academia, especially in China, must face in the past, present, and future.Unfortunately, existing literature worldwide has not constructed a common prosperity indicator consistent with the spirit of the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, making it impossible to research common prosperity. Therefore, this paper uses per capita income to represent “prosperity”, the national Gini coefficient to represent “inequality”, and(1-Gini coefficient) to represent “common”. Building upon Sen's(1976) welfare economics theory, this paper organically combines the two to construct a common prosperity indicator. Furthermore, drawing on the Mincer equation and Shapley's(1957) cooperative game theory, we propose a unified analytical framework to study the impact of any income determinant on common prosperity in the context of Chinese modernization. This is the theoretical and methodological contribution of this paper.Currently, the surging Fourth Industrial Revolution is impacting all aspects of the economy, society, and human life,and the profound impact of the digital economy on “prosperity”, “common”, and “common prosperity” is self-evident. In December 2023, the National Development and Reform Commission issued the Implementation Plan for Promoting Com-mon Prosperity through the Digital Economy, which clearly stated the goal of using digital means to promote balanced and sufficient development, enabling all the people to share the dividends of the digital era and contribute to achieving common prosperity in high-quality development. Clearly, focusing on the impact of the digital economy on common prosperity is not only of academic significance but also of profound practical and policy significance.This paper uses micro-level individual and city-level data to estimate China's level of common prosperity and analyze the impact of the digital economy on common prosperity for all. The research findings are as follows:(1) The digital economy has a significant growth effect, which is achieved by improving production efficiency and promoting innovation rather than extending working hours.(2) In a static sense, the digital economy is an important source of income inequality, especially in terms of its positive contribution to income disparities between high and low-income groups, between urban and rural areas, and between groups with different educational levels.(3) In a dynamic sense, as the digital economy continues to flourish, its unequal effects gradually weaken while the growth effect remains significant, overall contributing to promoting common prosperity. These are the empirical contributions of this paper.The digital economy and common prosperity are mutually reinforcing. However, this paper only provides a preliminary exploration of the relationship between the two. Further research is needed to refine and expand the indicators, analytical framework, model estimation, and policy implications. Specifically, the common prosperity indicator constructed in this paper relies on the Gini coefficient, which is just one measure of “inequality” and differs in nature from other indicators. Additionally, the framework of this paper can be used to analyze the impact of other factors such as cross-border trade and investment on common prosperity, as well as the influence of factors like the confirmation of land rights on common prosperity in rural China.