Digital Economy,Entrepreneurial Activity And Industrial Structure Optimization

The wave of information technology promotes the rapid development of digital economy,and countries have taken digital economy as an important measure to promote economic growth and optimize industrial structure.China has entered the new normal of economy and is in the critical period of industrial structure adjustment.Digital economy,as a typical representative of new economy,new business forms and new models,is bringing about great changes in various industries.While breeding new industries,it is also constantly transforming and upgrading traditional industries.In addition,the aging of the population,China’s economic development needs to change to innovation-driven mode.The government takes "digital China" which is put forward in the national "14th Five-Year Plan" as an important starting point for the transformation of industrial structure construction,digital industrialization and industrial digitalization of the development path.Therefore,the study of the important role of digital economy in the optimization of industrial structure can come to the core of the transformation and upgrading of China’s industrial structure,and provide theoretical basis and policy support for the optimization of industrial structure while enriching relevant theoretical research,which has both theoretical and practical significance.Then how much does digital economy promote the transformation and upgrading of industrial structure,and by which means? In order to solve these problem,based on the Statistical Classification of Digital Economy and Its Core Industries(2021)released by the National Bureau of Statistics,this paper first measures the development level of digital economy in 30 provinces of China from 2013 to 2019 by constructing a five-dimensional index system by using entropy method.The research finds that the development level of digital economy in all provinces of China gradually improves as time goes by,but the development differences among different regions are still large,the east region develops well while low in the west.Guangdong is the province with the highest level of digital economy development,and has ranked first for seven consecutive years.Based on measure digital economy,this paper introduces the entrepreneurial activity into unified theoretical framework of digital economy and industrial structure upgrade,systematically discusses the digital economy mechanism path that affects the upgrading of industrial structure,through the adoption of fixed effects model,the intermediary effect model and instrumental variable method for quantitative analysis of the relationship between the digital economy and the upgrading of industrial structure.The empirical results show that: first,digital economy not only has a positive effect on the optimization and upgrading of industrial structure,but also has a marginal increasing effect.Second,entrepreneurial activity has a good mediating effect on digital economy to promote industrial structure upgrading.Digital economy can promote industrial structure upgrading by improving the entrepreneurial level,which tests the policy practice of "Internet + innovation and entrepreneurship" proposed by the state for industrial structure optimization in recent years.Thirdly,the digital economy’s effect on the transformation and upgrading of industrial structure varies greatly among different regions in China.The digital economy has a strong promotion effect on the central and western regions,while it has a weak promotion effect on the eastern regions.It can be seen that the digital economy driven by the new generation of information technology is conducive to addressing the challenges of industrial structure transformation.Therefore,this paper puts forward the policy suggestions on the in-depth implementation of the "digital economy" strategy from the aspects of capital,technology and talent.At the same time,we should attach importance to the innovation and entrepreneurship of micro,small and medium-sized enterprises,continuing to improve the business environment through macroeconomic policies,and promote the transformation and upgrading of the industrial structure.