Digital infrastructure and intra-provincial balanced development: Evidence from China’s provincial panel data
Shuping Lin, Lingling Zuo, Tao Cen

TL;DR
This paper shows that digital infrastructure helps reduce regional imbalances within Chinese provinces, especially in more urbanized areas.
Contribution
The study introduces a novel focus on intra-provincial balanced development and identifies digital infrastructure as a key driver.
Findings
Digital infrastructure significantly promotes balanced regional development within provinces.
Technological innovation and industrial structure upgrading are key mechanisms behind this effect.
The impact is stronger in regions with higher urbanization levels.
Abstract
Unbalanced regional development poses a significant challenge to global economic growth. While existing studies have primarily concentrated on disparities between provinces, there is a notable lack of research addressing regional imbalances within a single province. In this paper, we use urban-level indicators to assess the level of intra-provincial regional balanced development in China. Based on provincial panel data from 2013 to 2022, we examine the impact of digital infrastructure on balanced regional development. We find that digital infrastructure significantly promotes balanced regional development using a fixed-effect regression model. This conclusion still holds after a series of robustness tests including instrumental variables, considering variable lag effects. Then we identify technological innovation and industrial structure upgrading as the primary mechanisms driving this…
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Taxonomy
TopicsFiscal Policy and Economic Growth · Regional Economics and Spatial Analysis · Energy, Environment, Economic Growth
