Research On The Impact Of Digital Economy On The Employment Structure And Quality Of Labor Force

In recent years,the scale of China’s digital economy has continuously increased.According to the data released in the "Global Digital Economy White Paper(2022)",the scale of China’s digital economy reached 7.1 trillion US dollars in 2021,second only to the United States.The continuous expansion of the scale of the digital economy and the continuous improvement of the level of digitization will have a huge impact and far-reaching impact on all aspects of the economy and society.Employment,as the foundation of people’s livelihood and social stability,is also affected by the development of the digital economy.The technological transformation caused by the digital economy will not only bring new employment opportunities,but also have a strong reshaping effect.In view of this,it is particularly important to study the characteristics of the employment structure of the workforce in the context of the development of the digital economy,identify the impact of the digital economy on the employment structure and employment quality,and propose timely national countermeasures.Firstly,based on the existing literature,this article reviews the current research progress on the employment effect of the digital economy,consolidates the theoretical foundation of the research,and clarifies the research context of relevant achievements;Secondly,starting from the four dimensions of labor skill structure,industrial structure,public and private sector structure,and entrepreneurial structure,this paper successively studies the structural impact of the digital economy on the labor market,and designs corresponding empirical research strategies to test it;Thirdly,from the perspective of labor employment quality,this paper studies the specific impact of the digital economy on labor work income,working hours,work stability,and social security;Finally,based on the summary of the above research theories and empirical research conclusions,this paper proposes countermeasures and suggestions for China to address the employment impact brought about by the development of the digital economy.Theoretical research and empirical testing have found that:(1)The impact of the digital economy on the employment skill structure of the workforce presents a "dual polarization" characteristic.That is,the digital economy has reduced the proportion of labor force with high school and junior high school qualifications,while increasing the proportion of labor force with primary school and below qualifications,and college and above qualifications.With the improvement of the development level of the digital economy,the eastern region has the greatest increase effect on the proportion of highly skilled labor,the central region has the strongest decrease effect on the proportion of medium skilled labor,and the central region has the greatest increase effect on the proportion of low skilled labor.(2)The digital economy has reduced the proportion of employment in the primary and secondary industries,increased the proportion of employment in the tertiary industry,especially increased the proportion of employment in productive services and high-end services,and promoted the upgrading of the industrial structure of employment.(3)The digital economy has reduced the probability of labor choosing employment in the public sector.The wage gap between the public and private sectors,the social status gap between the public and private sectors,and the risk of labor unemployment are three important channels through which the digital economy affects the employment choice of labor in the public and private sectors.(4)The digital economy has increased the probability of individual labor entrepreneurship,and increasing entrepreneurial opportunities,reducing the difficulty of obtaining information resources,expanding market scope,and reducing entrepreneurial costs are important channels for increasing the probability of individual entrepreneurship in the digital economy.(5)The impact of the digital economy on various dimensions of labor employment quality varies.Overall,the development of the digital economy has increased the income,working hours,and job stability of the workforce,reducing the level of social security for workers.The innovation and marginal contribution of this article lie in the following three aspects: Firstly,by directly examining the impact of the digital economy on the employment of labor with various levels of academic qualifications,it is an expansion and deepening of the "polarization" issue of the impact of the digital economy on the labor skill structure;By directly investigating the impact of the digital economy on the employment of labor in three major industries,and further exploring the impact of the digital economy on the employment of labor in various segments of the industry,the research on the impact of the digital economy on the industrial structure of labor employment has been enriched.Secondly,based on the wage gap,social status gap,and unemployment risk between the public and private sectors,in-depth research is conducted on the mechanism of the impact of the digital economy on labor force employment choices between the public and private sectors.The mechanism of the impact of the digital economy on labor force entrepreneurship choices is explored from aspects such as entrepreneurial opportunities,difficulty in obtaining information resources,market scope,and entrepreneurial costs,which provides a new perspective to explain the employment choices of the workforce between the public and private sectors,as well as workforce entrepreneurship decision-making.Thirdly,by constructing a theoretical analysis framework for the impact of the digital economy on the quality of labor employment,we systematically discuss the specific impact of the digital economy on labor work income,working hours,job stability,and social security,and discuss possible heterogeneity conclusions from multiple dimensions.This is a supplement and attempt to the research method of this issue,It also provides new theoretical explanations and empirical evidence for the conflicting conclusions of the impact of the digital economy on the quality of labor employment.