题目：Catching the wind：Transportation and Knowledge Spillover

报告人：马光荣   中国人民大学财政金融学院，教授

时间：2019年12月3日(周二) 10:00～11:30

地点：经管院B247

报告摘要：

This paper exploits exogenous variation in the construction of China’s High-Speed Railway (HSR) system to estimate the effect of reduction in transportation costs on the extent of geographical localization of knowledge spillovers in China. We show that connection to the HSR network leads to a 0.9% annual increase in the knowledge diffusion from a source (patent) to a beneficiary (city). The contribution of HSR connection is significantly positive even for cities located very faraway (within 3000km) from the source. However, the marginal benefit declines sharply over distance, with cities within 500 km enjoy the largest increase. We also show that peripheral cities—as opposed to metropolitan centers—experience significant improvement in innovation performance, possibly through the channel of enhanced spillover. Thus, transportation infrastructure mitigates regional disparity in knowledge accumulation and innovation. This paper exploits exogenous variation in the construction of China’s High-Speed Railway (HSR) system to estimate the effect of reduction in transportation costs on the extent of geographical localization of knowledge spillovers in China. We show that connection to the HSR network leads to a 0.9% annual increase in the knowledge diffusion from a source (patent) to a beneficiary (city). The contribution of HSR connection is significantly positive even for cities located very faraway (within 3000km) from the source. However, the marginal benefit declines sharply over distance, with cities within 500 km enjoy the largest increase. We also show that peripheral cities—as opposed to metropolitan centers—experience significant improvement in innovation performance, possibly through the channel of enhanced spillover. Thus, transportation infrastructure mitigates regional disparity in knowledge accumulation and innovation.

报告人简介：

马光荣，中国人民大学财政金融学院教授，博士毕业于北京大学国家发展研究院，主要研究方向为财政学和发展经济学，学术成果发表在American Economic Review、Journal of Comparative Economics、《中国社会科学》、《经济研究》、《管理世界》等学术期刊，支持国家自然科学基金项目多项，获得过中国经济学博士论文奖、财政部全国优秀财政理论成果奖、洪银兴经济学奖、邓子基财经论文奖等。