The Community Origins of Private Enterprise in China

Ruochen Dai (), Dilip Mookherjee, Kaivan Munshi () and Xiaobo Zhang
Additional contact information
Ruochen Dai: Peking University
Kaivan Munshi: University of Cambridge

No dp-320, Boston University - Department of Economics - The Institute for Economic Development Working Papers Series from Boston University - Department of Economics

Abstract: This paper identifies and quantifies the role played by birth-county-based community networks in the growth of private enterprise in China. The starting point for the analysis is the observation that population density is positively associated with local social interactions, social homogeneity, and enforceable trust in counties (but not cities). This motivates a model of network-based spillovers that predicts how the dynamics of firm entry, concentration, and firm size vary with birth county population density. The predictions of the model are validated over the 1990-2009 period with administrative data covering the universe of registered firms. Competing non-network-based explanations can explain some, but not all of the results. We subsequently estimate the structural parameters of the model and conduct counter-factual simulations, which indicate that entry and capital stock over the 1995-2004 period would have been 40% lower without community networks. Additional counter-factual simulations shed light on misallocation and industrial policy.

Keywords: Community; Networks.; Enforceable; Trust.; Entrepreneurship.; Misallocation.; Informal; Institutions.; Growth; and; Development. (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D31 I3 J12 J16 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 56 pages
Date: 2019-02
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cna, nep-ent, nep-tra and nep-ure
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

Downloads: (external link)
http://people.bu.edu/dilipm/wkpap/ChinaoverallV31.pdf

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:bos:iedwpr:dp-320

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Boston University - Department of Economics - The Institute for Economic Development Working Papers Series from Boston University - Department of Economics Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Program Coordinator ().