A generalized Okun's Law: Uncovering the myth of China's labor market resilience
A generalized Okun's Law: Uncovering the myth of China's labor market resilience
复制标题
广义的奥肯定律：揭开中国劳动力市场弹性的神话
DOI：
10.1111/rode.12379
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发表时间：
2018-08-01
影响因子：
1.6
通讯作者：
Shen, Guangjun
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Liu, Xiaoguang;Lam, Raphael;Shen, Guangjun
稳定的劳动力市场是大多数国家的政策重点，特别是在全球金融危机爆发之后。与大多数国家不同，中国的劳动力市场似乎保持良好，尽管经济增长急剧放缓。本文认为，有潜在的基本机制，有助于解释中国劳动力市场的弹性。理解中国劳动力市场动态的关键是，在快速城市化过程中，农村到城市的流动人口比城市工人对增长更敏感，这是缓冲就业对不利冲击的主要减震器。因此，我们提出了一个广义奥肯定律（GOL），将移民流动与失业率，以捕捉劳动力市场动态和经济周期之间的关系。原始奥肯定律可以看作是已经完成城市化的发达国家的GOL的一个特例。通过对中国全国和城市层面数据以及跨国面板数据的实证分析，我们发现了支持GOL理论的有力证据。本文的研究结果对更深入地理解奥肯定律的智慧及其在劳动力市场政策中的应用具有启示意义。
A stable labor market is a policy priority for most countries, especially after the burst of the global financial crisis. Unlike most countries, the labor market in China appears to be holding up well, despite sharp slowdown in economic growth. This paper argues that there are underlying fundamental mechanisms that help explain the resilience of China's labor market. The key to understanding labor market dynamics in China is that rural‐to‐urban migrant flows are more sensitive to growth than urban workers in the process of fast urbanization, which serves as a main shock absorber to buffer employment against adverse shocks. Therefore, we propose a generalized Okun's Law (GOL) that incorporates migrant flows with unemployment rates to capture the relation between labor market dynamics and economic cycles. The original Okun's Law can be regarded as a special case of the GOL for developed countries that have already completed urbanization. Conducting empirical analysis with both China's national‐ and city‐level data and cross‐country panel data, we find strong evidence supporting the GOL theory. Findings in the paper have implications for a deeper understanding of the wisdom of Okun's Law and its application in labor market policies.