The Puzzle of the Evolution in China's Return to Capital

资本回报率对于理解宏观经济运行具有重要意义。本文旨在测算省际资本回报率和资本错配程度,以及考察资本错配程度对资本回报率的影响,进而判断中国经济是否长期可持续发展。在市场不完全的环境下,将资本回报率变动分解为资本深化速度、技术进步增长率、乘数效应和资本错配变动速度四个部分,构建资本错配程度影响资本回报率的计量模型,结合资本回报率和错配指数的省际面板数据,对中国经济中资本错配影响资本回报率进行实证分析。结果发现,1978—2013年中国接近1/2的省份存在资本相对劳动配置过度的现象,而且这种资本错配现象没有明显的地区差异。实证研究表明,1978—2013年中国资本回报率嬗变是资本错配程度降低等带来的整体经济基本面长期改善和金融危机等短期冲击造成的负面影响综合作用的结果。期间,资本错配降低显著提高资本回报率水平,资本错配程度每降低1个标准差会使得资本回报率上升约0.11个标准差,资本错配程度降低对于资本回报率的下行存在显著的支撑作用。进一步分析发现,资本错配对于资本回报率的影响具有地区异质性和改革阶段异质性。因此,中国经济长期可持续发展具有良好基础。The index of return to capital is important for understanding the macroeconomic operation. This paper aims to evaluate the influence of capital misallocation to the rate of return to capital, and to determine whether China＇s economy is sustainable. Under the assumption of an imperfect competition market, this paper decomposes the change in return to capital into four parts： the rate of capital deepening, the growth rate of technical progress, the multiplier effect, the change of capital misallocation, and builds an econometric model to check the effect of misallocation on the return to capital, using the provincial panel data. Results shows that over- investment exists in nearly half provinces of China, furthermore, this phenomenon has no significantly regional difference. The empirical research shows that the cause of change in the rate of return to capital in China is the mismatches of fundamentals improve brought by falling of capital misallocation and negative impact by financial crisis broken in 2008 during 1978 to 2013. During the period, the decrease of the standard deviation of capital mismatch would result in a rise of about 0.11 standard deviation of the rate of return to capital. Further analysis finds that the impact of capital mismatches on the rate of return on capital has regional heterogeneity and reform phase heterogeneity. Therefore, the development of China＇s economy in the long-term is sustainable.教育部人文社会科学重点研究基地重大项目“矫正要素配置扭曲与促进经济有效增长”(批准号16JJD790031)；教育部人文社会科学研究规划基金项目“行业工资差异、劳动力错配与我国产业结构调整和产出增长”(批准号16YJA790003)；国家社会科学基金重大项目“需求结构转化背景下提高消费对经济增长贡献的研究”(批准号15ZDC011)