TITLE:
Heterogeneous Economic Impacts of Transportation Features on Prefecture-Level Chinese Cities
AUTHORS:
Bismark R. D. K. Agbelie, Yang Chen, Nimesh Salike
KEYWORDS:
Chinese Cities, Economic Growth, Heterogeneity, Highway, Railway, Freight, Random-Parameters Model
JOURNAL NAME:
Theoretical Economics Letters,
Vol.7 No.3,
March
17,
2017
ABSTRACT: The present paper examines the heterogeneous
economic impacts of transportation characteristics, with a consideration of
spatial heterogeneity, across Chinese prefecture-level cities. Using data from
237 Chinese cities from 2000 to 2012, a random-parameters model is applied to
account for the heterogeneity across these
cities. The estimation results reveal significant variability across cities,
with the computed impacts (elasticity values) of transportation-related features
(highway and railway freight volumes, highway passenger volume, urbanization
rate, public transit, paved roads, and highway congestion rate) varying
significantly across cities. The impacts are mostly positive, except for
highway congestion rate. A 1% increase in a city’s highway and railway freight
volumes would increase the city’s gross product per capita from 0.0001% to
0.0972% and 0.0001% to 0.0254% across cities in China, respectively. While a 1%
increase in highway congestion rate would decrease the city’s gross product per
capita by an average of 0.031%.