Urban economic efficiency under the interactive effect of urban hierarchy and connection networks in China

The efficient development of the urban economy is a major concern of scholars in the fields of geography and urban science.In the context of globalization,informatization,industrialization,and urbanization,the external relationships of China's cities are experiencing the joint action of urban scale hierarchies and connection networks(“hierarchy-network”).However,under the interactive effect of the two,the mechanism of urban economic efficiency(UEE)is unclear.Therefore,based on Baidu migration data,the regionalization with dynamically constrained agglomerative clustering and partitioning(REDCAP)method,and a spatial simultaneous equation model,this paper analyzes the UEE spatial pattern and mechanism in China.The results indicate that:(1)the urban economy has a superlinear relationship with the population size.However,the benefit of this superlinear growth is in marginal decline.(2)The UEE shows a pattern of differentiation between China's eastern,then central,and then western region.Also,local differences are found within the three major sub-regions.(3)The increase of urban network centrality can promote UEE,while the impact of urban scale is negative.(4)There is regional heterogeneity of the interactive effect of“hierarchy-network”on UEE.This study reveals the influencing mechanism of UEE and also provides policy implications for the development of UEE.