Research On The Impact Of Population Outflow On Human Capital In Shrinking Cities

With the advent of the 21 st century,due to de-industrialization,population ageing and the transition of socio-economic,many countries and regions population has changed from a long period of growth to a recession.At present,the density of population and the urbanization pattern of dramatic structural changes.It’s necessary to quantitative analysis on different types and characteristics of shrinking cities has become the urgent request of urbanization.How to make the shrinking cities "small but beautiful" and "small but strong" needs more attention from the government and the academia.The decline of population will not necessarily lead to economic recession,and human capital also plays a vital role in shrinking the development of cities.This paper sets up the analytical framework of population emigration affecting human capital stock in terms on an assumption that human capital stock is the basis for the revival and development of shrinking cities.This paper,with the prefecture-level cities with a resident population under 1 million in the municipal districts as the case study,established a baseline and a model threshold model to explore the effects of population outflow on human capital stock in shrinking cities and unshrinking cities.And is there a nonlinear relationship between population outflow and human capital? Which reason caused this nonlinear relationship? We used the POI data of educational services to replace the index of family education investment in prefecture-level cities to explore whether the incentive mediating effect mechanism is established.These results show that:(1)There are 116 shrinking cities in 93 small and medium-sized cities,and the average emigration rate of shrinking cities is 0.612%,mainly distributed in the three northeastern provinces and Sichuan,Shanxi,Hubei and other provinces.(2)Now in China’s small and medium-sized cities,the net outflow of population has both inhibition and promotion effects on local human capital stock.Different types of cities have differences,but generally speaking,the promotion effect is less than the inhibition effect and the labor outflow has a significant negative effect on local human capital stock.(3)Family education investment in population outflow plays a significant intermediary role in affecting local human capital stock.Although the ratio of family education investment intermediary effects to total effects is not high at present,return of education investment has longtime effect,and its benefits will be more obvious in the future.(4)Different types of cities have different threshold variable.Registered urban unemployment rate has a significant threshold effect in shrinking cities.When the unemployment rate is at a moderate level,the positive effect on human capital stock is maximum and low or high unemployment rate was struggling to improve local human capital stock.Per capita disposable income has a significant threshold effect in unshrinking cities and it will have higher inhibitory effect after crossing the threshold.(5)In addition,accelerating the transformation and upgrading of industrial structure,carrying out the construction of environment in urban areas,accelerating the construction of basic infrastructure,stimulating urban economic vitality and improving economic output efficiency can improve the level of human capital as well.Finally,based on the above research conclusions,it is proposed that we should accept the reality of shrinkage and formulate corresponding policies with the population reduction as the expectation.Strengthen the cultivation of labor market and create more jobs;Strengthen functional orientation and actively integrate into the development of urban agglomeration.