Research On Effects Of Special Econmoic Zones On Employment And Human Capital Investment

How to adjust the employment structure and improve the quality of employment while keeping the growth of total employment has become an important issue for the Chinese government.Meanwhile,China will start the transformation of new and old kinetic energy in manufacturing industry during the 14 th Five-Year Plan period.In order to fill the talent gap in the fields of information technology and high-end manufacturing,we need to further encourage human capital investment and accelerate the cultivation of high skilled talents.As a typical place-based policy,Special Economic Zone(SEZ)has been a test field to promote the high-quality development of urbanization and industrial upgrading.To understand the impact and mechanism of SEZ on employment and human capital investment will help the government to make scientific and effective policy,so as to form a long-term mechanism for stable employment and talent cultivation.On the basis of the existing literature research,this thesis first theoretically analyzes the economic mechanism of SEZ on employment and human capital investment from the two dimensions of quantity and quality;Based on micro survey data,this thesis uses difference-in-differences model to identify the impact of the establishment of SEZ on the employment probability and employment matching degree of local labor at the individual level;Finally,based on China 1% population sample survey and micro survey data,this thesis quantitatively measures the impact and heterogeneity of SEZ on high school enrollment rate and students' academic performance,and analyzes economic mechanism of the policy effect.The main conclusions of empirical research are as follows:(1)SEZ significantly improves local employment.Compared with counties without SEZ,the establishment of SEZ is associated with 5.0 percentage points increase in the probability of finding a job.Expanding the scale of employment market,increasing wages and improving working conditions are major mechanisms of the policy effect.(2)SEZ has significantly positive effects on local employment matching quality.A newly-built SEZ in the treatment group leads to a significant decrease by 0.14 standard deviation in employment mismatch for local areas comparing with the control group.To specify,three main approaches to improve the employment matching degree of SEZ are expanding the scale of the employment market,adjusting industrial structure and increasing demand for professional skills.(3)SEZ significantly promotes human capital investment of local families.From the perspective of quantity and quality,SEZ increases the high school enrollment rate by 1.7%,and local students' math and Chinese scores by 4.4 percentage points and 6.1 points.Income effect,labor demand shock and infrastructure construction are important mechanisms of the effect.Based on theoretical and empirical findings,this thesis provides quantitative decision support for the government to formulate place-based policies scientifically and rationally:(1)To solve insufficient employment and structural problems,local government should fully understand the effect of SEZ on high-quality employment;(2)Local government should bring the role of SEZ to promote family's human capital investment into full play,and promote the development of “Talents and Technology Strategy for Powerful Nation”;(3)Government should pay attention to the differences of effects on employment and human capital investment in different regions and socioeconomic environment,and evaluate scientifically to avoid inefficient or even negative effects in some cases,so as to improve quality of people-oriented SEZ policies.