| A country with strong transportation,railways go first.As an important prior social capital,high-speed railways are increasingly becoming an important grip to boost the economy and upgrade industries,in addition to undertaking basic passenger and freight functions.As the pillar of the national economy and the foundation of the real economy,promoting the upgrading of the manufacturing industry is a key strategic support for the construction of a modern economic system and an important criterion for measuring the comprehensive strength and international competitiveness of a country’s economy.As the artery of China’s national economy,high-speed rail has the functions and advantages of compressing space-time distance,promoting the flow of labor,capital,technology and other factors,and enhancing accessibility,which are highly compatible with the current requirements of China’s manufacturing industry to shift from labor-intensive processing to capital and technology-intensive production,and to enhance production efficiency and innovation capacity.In the era of promoting the high-quality development of China’s manufacturing industry and building a manufacturing and quality power,it is important to explore the impact and mechanism of the opening of high-speed rail on the upgrading of the manufacturing industry,which is of great significance for the scientific location of high-speed rail stations,the optimal layout of industries and the cultivation of new urban economic growth poles.Based on this,this thesis treats the opening of high-speed rail in cities as a natural experiment,selects balanced panel data of prefecture-level and above cities across China from2006-2019,and empirically examines the impact and path of effect of the opening of high-speed rail on the upgrading of manufacturing industries in cities along the route using a double-difference propensity score matching model(PSM-DID).Based on theories of industrial agglomeration and industrial upgrading,this paper compares the impact mechanism of HSR opening on manufacturing upgrading and provides empirical evidence that HSR opening promotes manufacturing upgrading through three paths: optimizing resource allocation,reducing production costs and factor spatial spillover effects.In the empirical analysis,this paper takes 140 cities at prefectural level and above across China as the research target,and adopts 2011 as the policy implementation node to comprehensively characterize the manufacturing upgrading index in three dimensions,namely economic creation capacity,social service capacity and resource utilization capacity,to estimate the policy effect of the opening of high-speed rail on manufacturing upgrading.Further,heterogeneity analysis is conducted from four micro perspectives,namely,city geographic location,city volume and scale,city class,and city HSR station type,to examine the differences in the impact of HSR opening on manufacturing upgrading.At the same time,considering the service industry as the direct target of HSR and the high degree of integration between the production service industry and the manufacturing industry,Bootstrap intermediary effect analysis is used to examine the intermediary role of the production service industry agglomeration between the opening of HSR and the upgrading of the manufacturing industry.Finally,to ensure the reliability of the findings,the robustness of this paper’s research was tested using placebo tests,substitution of explanatory variables and estimation of a DID model extended to multiple periods.Through theoretical construction and empirical research analysis,this paper draws the following conclusions:(1)In general,the opening of high-speed rail improves the economic creation capacity,social service capacity and resource utilization capacity of the manufacturing industry through enhancing regional accessibility and promoting the flow of capital,technology,labor and other factors,thus improving the overall productivity of the manufacturing industry and thus promoting the upgrading of the manufacturing industry.(2)In the time dimension,the impact of the opening of high-speed rail on the upgrading of manufacturing industries in cities along the route shows an obvious time dynamic.The effect of high-speed rail policy usually peaks within the third to fourth year after the opening of high-speed rail,and then gradually decreases or even disappears.(3)From a regional perspective,there is significant heterogeneity in the impact of the opening of HSR on cities in different regions,with different volumes,grades and types of stations.In general,it has a significant boosting effect on eastern cities,large cities,first-tier and new first-tier cities,and urban center-type station cities,while there is a significant siphoning effect on western cities,small and medium-sized cities,fourth and fifth-tier cities,and urban periphery-type stations.(4)From the perspective of the impact process,while the opening of high-speed rail affects the upgrading of the manufacturing industry,the agglomeration of productive service industries plays a significant intermediary effect in it,accounting for 7.6% of the overall effect.Among them,the intermediary effect is strongest in the eastern region,accounting for13.12% of the overall effect,while other regions are not significant,indicating that the agglomeration level and service capacity of the production service industry need to be further improved.Finally,according to the evaluation results of high-speed rail policy effects,policy recommendations are put forward in terms of strengthening investment in transportation infrastructure,optimizing industrial spatial layout,and promoting industrial integration and interaction. |
