Study On The County Economic Convergence Of Wuhan Urban Circle

Wuhan urban circle is the core component of the urban agglomeration in the middle reaches of the Yangtze River, occupying an important position in the pattern of China’s regional economic development. The county economy of Wuhan urban circle also plays an important role in the economic development of the city circle. The research and analysis of the development characteristics and convergence of the county economy in Wuhan urban circle since 2004 is the premise of grasping the overall regional economic development and the growth trend as well as the development of the corresponding regional development policy, which is of special and important practical significance for Wuhan urban circle where is surrounding by Dabie Mountain poverty areas and Mufu mountain poverty belt.In this paper, we make a statistical description to the disparities of per capita GDP, per capita disposable income of urban residents and the per capita net income of rural residents of Wuhan urban circle with five indicators of Range, standard deviation, maximum slip, variation coefficient and Gene coefficient in absolute difference and relative difference. The data shows that the absolute difference of per capita GDP in Wuhan city circle is increasing and the relative difference is decreasing. The absolute difference of county residents’income in urban circle is also expanding. The relative differences in the income of rural residents increased gradually after 2008, which also happened in urban residents after 2009.In the fourth chapter, using the Barro’s economic growth convergence model to test the absolute β convergence of county per capita GDP from 2004 to 2013 in Wuhan urban circle with panel data on the basis of the new classical economic growth theory. The results show that there exists absolute β convergence in Wuhan city circle, and the convergence coefficient is -0.086. According to the theory of the growth of the county, we examine the influence factor of county economy convergence with five indicators of the social workers accounted for the proportion of the total population, the rate of capital investment, the proportion of the third industry, urbanization rate and government expenditure. These explanatory variables all have a significant effect on the economic growth of the county, especially in the social workers accounted for the proportion of the total population and urbanization rate with the the most obvious economic promotion, meanwhile, the investment rate of fixed assets has the smallest pulling effect. Using time series unit root test method to test the convergence of the per capita income of urban residents, the test results show that there is no a convergence of income of urban residents and rural residents in 2004-2013 years.Utilizing Dowrick-Rogers framework to analyze the mechanism of the economic convergence of Wuhan urban circle, we found that the marginal benefit of the new classical economic growth theory in 2004-2013 is the reason of the convergence of the county economy in the city circle. The convergence mechanism of technology diffusion didn’t happen in the county of city circle.At the last part of the article, corresponding policy recommendations are put forwarded, including increasing employment and investment in people’s livelihood, promoting the transfer of farmers, improving the rate of urbanization and the efficiency of investment in fixed assets, accelerating the development of the county service industry and the transformation of government functions.