IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/asieco/v75y2021ics1049007821000518.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Technological diffusion, migration and entrepreneurship in China

Author

Listed:
  • Zhang, Sihan
  • Qiu, Leiju
  • Zhao, Daxuan

Abstract

In the past decades, China has been experiencing a huge mass of internal migration with rapid economic development. Using the 2005 Census data, our paper empirically explores how migration experiences affect entrepreneurship heterogeneously. The “falling” migration experiences, from a relatively developed place to a developing place, could enhance the human capital accumulation of migrant workers and assist them to become entrepreneurs. Moreover, we find that migrant entrepreneurs are more likely to engage in the industry with a comparative advantage in their original residential places. That is, technology diffuses with migration.

Suggested Citation

  • Zhang, Sihan & Qiu, Leiju & Zhao, Daxuan, 2021. "Technological diffusion, migration and entrepreneurship in China," Journal of Asian Economics, Elsevier, vol. 75(C).
  • Handle: RePEc:eee:asieco:v:75:y:2021:i:c:s1049007821000518
    DOI: 10.1016/j.asieco.2021.101322
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1049007821000518
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.asieco.2021.101322?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. repec:bla:rdevec:v:3:y:1999:i:2:p:170-86 is not listed on IDEAS
    2. Démurger, Sylvie & Xu, Hui, 2011. "Return Migrants: The Rise of New Entrepreneurs in Rural China," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 39(10), pages 1847-1861.
    3. Li, Lixing & Wu, Xiaoyu, 2014. "Housing price and entrepreneurship in China," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 42(2), pages 436-449.
    4. Claudio Michelacci & Olmo Silva, 2007. "Why So Many Local Entrepreneurs?," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 89(4), pages 615-633, November.
    5. Wahba, Jackline & Zenou, Yves, 2012. "Out of sight, out of mind: Migration, entrepreneurship and social capital," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 42(5), pages 890-903.
    6. Do, Quy-Toan & Levchenko, Andrei A. & Raddatz, Claudio, 2016. "Comparative advantage, international trade, and fertility," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 119(C), pages 48-66.
    7. Zhang, Kevin Honglin & Song, Shunfeng, 2003. "Rural-urban migration and urbanization in China: Evidence from time-series and cross-section analyses," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 14(4), pages 386-400.
    8. de Mel, Suresh & McKenzie, David & Woodruff, Christopher, 2008. "Who are the microenterprise owners ? Evidence from Sri Lanka on Tokman v. de Soto," Policy Research Working Paper Series 4635, The World Bank.
    9. Robert W. Fairlie & Harry A. Krashinsky, 2012. "Liquidity Constraints, Household Wealth, And Entrepreneurship Revisited," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 58(2), pages 279-306, June.
    10. Fu, Yuming & Gabriel, Stuart A., 2012. "Labor migration, human capital agglomeration and regional development in China," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 42(3), pages 473-484.
    11. Nadeem Ilahi, 1999. "Return Migration and Occupational Change," Review of Development Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 3(2), pages 170-186, June.
    12. Florin P. Vadean & Matloob Piracha, 2009. "Circular Migration or Permanent Return: What Determines Different Forms of Migration?," Studies in Economics 0912, School of Economics, University of Kent.
    13. Banerjee, Abhijit V & Newman, Andrew F, 1993. "Occupational Choice and the Process of Development," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 101(2), pages 274-298, April.
    14. Iyigun, Murat F & Owen, Ann L, 1998. "Risk, Entrepreneurship, and Human-Capital Accumulation," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 88(2), pages 454-457, May.
    15. Hausmann, Ricardo & Nedelkoska, Ljubica, 2018. "Welcome home in a crisis: Effects of return migration on the non-migrants' wages and employment," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 101(C), pages 101-132.
    16. Pierre-Philippe Combes & Sylvie Démurger & Shi Li, 2017. "Productivity Gains from Agglomeration and Migration in the People's Republic of China between 2002 and 2013," Asian Development Review, MIT Press, vol. 34(2), pages 184-200, September.
    17. Fairlie, Robert W. & Lofstrom, Magnus, 2013. "Immigration and Entrepreneurship," IZA Discussion Papers 7669, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    18. Michael S. Dahl & Olav Sorenson, 2012. "Home Sweet Home: Entrepreneurs' Location Choices and the Performance of Their Ventures," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 58(6), pages 1059-1071, June.
    19. Jialu Liu, 2011. "Human capital, migration and rural entrepreneurship in China," Indian Growth and Development Review, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 4(2), pages 100-122, September.
    20. Martin, Bruce C. & McNally, Jeffrey J. & Kay, Michael J., 2013. "Examining the formation of human capital in entrepreneurship: A meta-analysis of entrepreneurship education outcomes," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 28(2), pages 211-224.
    21. Aydin, Hamit & Tilton, John E., 2000. "Mineral endowment, labor productivity, and comparative advantage in mining," Resource and Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 22(4), pages 281-293, October.
    22. Hausmann, Ricardo & Nedelkoska, Ljubica, 2017. "Welcome Home in a Crisis: Effects of Return Migration on the Non-Migrants’ Wages and Employment," Working Paper Series rwp17-015, Harvard University, John F. Kennedy School of Government.
    23. Piracha, Matloob & Vadean, Florin, 2010. "Return Migration and Occupational Choice: Evidence from Albania," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 38(8), pages 1141-1155, August.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Naudé, Wim & Siegel, Melissa & Marchand, Katrin, 2015. "Migration, Entrepreneurship and Development: A Critical Review," IZA Discussion Papers 9284, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    2. Li Yu & Xundong Yin & Xiang Zheng & Wenwei Li, 2017. "Lose to win: entrepreneurship of returned migrants in China," The Annals of Regional Science, Springer;Western Regional Science Association, vol. 58(2), pages 341-374, March.
    3. Ajzenman, Nicolás & Aksoy, Cevat Giray & Guriev, Sergei, 2022. "Exposure to transit migration: Public attitudes and entrepreneurship," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 158(C).
    4. Tiwari, Smriti, 2021. "Do macroeconomic fluctuations at destination matter in determining migrants’ return decisions?," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 148(C).
    5. Marchetta, Francesca, 2012. "Return Migration and the Survival of Entrepreneurial Activities in Egypt," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 40(10), pages 1999-2013.
    6. Vereno Brugiatelli, 2022. "Living, Narrating and Enhancing the Landscape Through the Ethics of Responsibility," European Journal of Multidisciplinary Studies Articles, Revistia Research and Publishing, vol. 7, ejms_v7_i.
    7. Wim Naudé & Melissa Siegel & Katrin Marchand, 2017. "Migration, entrepreneurship and development: critical questions," IZA Journal of Migration and Development, Springer;Forschungsinstitut zur Zukunft der Arbeit GmbH (IZA), vol. 6(1), pages 1-16, December.
    8. Nicolás Ajzenman & Cevat Giray Aksoy & Sergei Guriev, 2020. "Exposure to Transit Migration, Public Attitudes and Entrepreneurship," Department of Economics Working Papers wp_gob_2020_02, Universidad Torcuato Di Tella.
    9. Liqiong Lin & Mohamad D. Revindo & Christopher Gan & Quang Thi Thieu Nguyen, 2021. "Return home and start new businesses: internal migration in China," Asian-Pacific Economic Literature, The Crawford School, The Australian National University, vol. 35(1), pages 49-66, May.
    10. Wassink, Joshua, 2020. "International migration experience and entrepreneurship: Evidence from Mexico," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 136(C).
    11. Kevin J. A. Thomas & Christopher Inkpen, 2013. "Migration Dynamics, Entrepreneurship, and African Development: Lessons from Malawi," International Migration Review, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 47(4), pages 844-873, December.
    12. Mahé, Clothilde, 2016. "Skills and entrepreneurship: Are return migrants 'Jacks-of-all-trades'?," MERIT Working Papers 2016-071, United Nations University - Maastricht Economic and Social Research Institute on Innovation and Technology (MERIT).
    13. Bertoli, Simone & Marchetta, Francesca, 2015. "Bringing It All Back Home – Return Migration and Fertility Choices," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 65(C), pages 27-40.
    14. El-Mallakh, Nelly & Wahba, Jackline, 2021. "Upward or downward: Occupational mobility and return migration," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 137(C).
    15. Luigi Capoani & Cristoforo Imbesi & Francesca Rinaldi & Claudio Annibali, 2024. "Return migration, self-selection and labour market outcomes," ECONOMIA PUBBLICA, FrancoAngeli Editore, vol. 2024(2), pages 191-228.
    16. Mezger Kveder, Cora Leonie & Flahaux, Marie-Laurence, 2013. "Returning to Dakar: A Mixed Methods Analysis of the Role of Migration Experience for Occupational Status," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 45(C), pages 223-238.
    17. Démurger, Sylvie & Xu, Hui, 2011. "Return Migrants: The Rise of New Entrepreneurs in Rural China," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 39(10), pages 1847-1861.
    18. Huang, Bin & Tani, Massimiliano & Zhu, Yu, 2021. "Does higher education make you more entrepreneurial? Causal evidence from China," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 135(C), pages 543-558.
    19. Laurent Bossavie & Çağlar Özden, 2023. "Impacts of Temporary Migration on Development in Origin Countries," The World Bank Research Observer, World Bank, vol. 38(2), pages 249-294.
    20. Piracha, Matloob & Randazzo, Teresa & Vadean, Florin, 2013. "Remittances and Occupational Outcomes of the Household Members Left-Behind," IZA Discussion Papers 7582, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Migration; Entrepreneurship; Technological diffusion; Human capital;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • L26 - Industrial Organization - - Firm Objectives, Organization, and Behavior - - - Entrepreneurship
    • R23 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - Household Analysis - - - Regional Migration; Regional Labor Markets; Population
    • O33 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Technological Change: Choices and Consequences; Diffusion Processes

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:asieco:v:75:y:2021:i:c:s1049007821000518. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/asieco .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.