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Stay Hungry, and Stay Calm in Upbeat Time: Local Leaders' Early‐Life Famine Experience and Housing Sector Development in China

Year: 2024

Type: article

Abstract: ABSTRACT This paper shows that local officials' personal preferences formed through early‐life experience affects Chinese housing sector development. We exploit a county‐level panel between 2000 and 2007 and use the Great Famine in 1959–1961 in China as a natural experiment. Our specification exploits the spatial variation in the early‐life exposure to the famine, and shows that local officials' early‐life exposure to more severe famine leads to significantly less development in the housing sector in their jurisdictions. Our findings remain robust to alternative specifications, placebo tests, and competing hypotheses. Furthermore, we employ satellite nightlight data to show that the early‐life famine experience of local officials is negatively correlated with the extent of statistical data manipulation, indicating changing risk attitudes due to early‐life famine experiences.

Source: Journal of Regional Science

DOI: 10.1111/jors.12741

Authors: Linke Hou, Pinghan Liang, Siyuan Lyu

Institutions: Shandong University, Sun Yat-sen University, Stony Brook University

Language: English

Topic: China's Socioeconomic Reforms and Governance

Subfield: Political Science and International Relations

Field: Social Sciences

Domain: Social Sciences

SDGs: Peace, justice, and strong institutions, No poverty

Open Access status: bronze

Funders: National Natural Science Foundation of China, National Office for Philosophy and Social Sciences