Significant Factors Influencing Rural Residents’ Well-Being with Regard to Electricity Consumption: An Empirical Analysis in China

Sen Guo, Huiru Zhao, Chunjie Li, Haoran Zhao and Bingkang Li
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Sen Guo: School of Economics and Management, North China Electric Power University, Beijing 102206, China
Huiru Zhao: School of Economics and Management, North China Electric Power University, Beijing 102206, China
Chunjie Li: School of Economics and Management, North China Electric Power University, Beijing 102206, China
Haoran Zhao: School of Economics and Management, North China Electric Power University, Beijing 102206, China
Bingkang Li: School of Economics and Management, North China Electric Power University, Beijing 102206, China

Sustainability, 2016, vol. 8, issue 11, 1-13

Abstract: The electric universal service policy, which has been implemented for many years in China, aims to meet the basic electricity demands of rural residents. Electricity consumption can facilitate the daily life of rural residents, such as lighting and cooking, which are necessary to their well-being. In practice, the well-being of rural residents due to electricity consumption is influenced by many factors. Therefore, to improve the well-being of rural residents, it is quite necessary to identify and optimize the significant factors that make the electric universal service policy play its prescribed role as well as possible. In this paper, the significant factors influencing rural residents’ well-being obtained from electricity consumption were identified and discussed by employing the Ordered Probit model. The results indicate that: (1) there are six significant factors, of which ‘educational level’, ‘health condition’, ‘each person income of a family per month’, and ‘service time of household appliances’ play positive roles in rural residents’ well-being, while ‘average power interruption times’ and ‘monthly electric charges’ have negative impacts; (2) for significant factors with positive roles, ‘educational level’ and ‘health condition’ show larger marginal effects on rural residents’ well-being; and (3) for significant factors with negative impacts, ‘average power interruption times’ has the greatest marginal effect. Finally, policy implications are proposed for improving rural residents’ well-being, which can also contribute to the effective implementation of the electric universal service policy in China.

Keywords: well-being; electricity consumption; rural residents; significant factors; Ordered Probit model; China (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2016
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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