Theoretical And Empirical Research On The Impact Of Knowledge Complexity On China’s Economic Growth

With the advent of the era of knowledge economy,the production and application of knowledge,especially complex knowledge,has become more and more significant in promoting economic growth,and has increasingly become a decisive force in promoting sustained economic growth.However,the existing literature rarely involves the distribution characteristics of China’s urban complex knowledge or the relationship between it and regional economic growth.Therefore,in the key period of changing the mode of economic development and promoting high-quality economic development,it is extremely important to provide a new direction for China’s economic growth from the perspective of knowledge complexity.In this context,this paper aims to explore the theoretical mechanism and empirical results of the impact of China’s knowledge complexity on economic growth,and to propose effective suggestions.Firstly,on the basis of combing the relevant literature and measurement methods at home and abroad,through the invention patent data of325 cities in China from 2000 to 2016,this paper calculates the corresponding knowledge complexity index(KCI)and technology complexity index(TCI)through the fitness-complexity method(FCM),and combines the reflection method(HH)to calculate the urban diversity and the universality of urban knowledge.On this basis,the network characteristics,spatial distribution characteristics and local knowledge base of urban knowledge in China are analyzed.Secondly,this paper constructs the theoretical mechanism of knowledge complexity on regional economic growth from three aspects: direct path,indirect path and heterogeneity effect,and further verifies the theoretical hypothesis through fixed effect model,quantile regression,robustness test,intermediary effect test and heterogeneity test.The results show that:(1)During the observation period,the knowledge complexity index of Chinese cities continues to improve,indicating that the ability of cities to produce and use complex knowledge has improved,but the gap in the spatial distribution of knowledge complexity among regions continues to expand,showing the Matthew effect that the stronger the stronger and the weaker the weaker.(2)Developed cities have more diversified and low ubiquitous technologies,and the types of local knowledge base are richer,which makes them have more advantages in developing new technologies.While the local knowledge base of relatively backward cities is relatively single,they often face the characteristics of "low risk,low return" or "high risk,low return" in developing new technologies,which makes them easy to fall into technology lock,this has created a vicious circle between the development of new technologies and the slow economic growth.(3)Knowledge complexity has significantly promoted China’s overall economic growth through technological innovation and network effect,but it has different effects in different regions due to different levels of economic development and cooperation.Finally,this paper puts forward corresponding policy suggestions from four aspects: strengthening the accumulation of human capital,promoting the iterative upgrading of innovation network,promoting regional balanced development and improving the industrial public service system.