【主讲】 聂辉华，副教授，中国人民大学经济学院学院

【主题】 中国的分权、合谋与矿难

【时间】 2011-11-17（周四）14:00-15:30

【地点】 清华经管学院 伟伦楼401

【语言】 英文

【主办】 清华大学经济管理学院经济系

【Speaker】 Huihua Nie, Associate Professor, Renmin University of China

【Topic】 Decentralization, Collusion and Coalmine Deaths in China

【Time】 14:00-15:30, 2011-11-17, Thursday

【Venue】 Weilun 401, Tsinghua SEM

【Language】English

【Organizer】Department of Economics

Abstract

We propose a political-economics model of decentralization (by the central government) and collusion (between the local government and firms) to explain high death rates in the coalmine industry in China, where the local government allows the firms to choose dangerous but high-payoff production technology when collusion is feasible. Our model predicts a positive effect of decentralization, a negative effect of media exposure and a positive effect of collusion on death rates. We collect a provincial level panel dataset from 1995 to 2005 and compare the decentralization period (1998 to 2000) with the adjacent centralization periods. We find that decentralization increases death rates and that media exposure (proxied by newspapers published per 1000 individuals) decreases death rates. Moreover, we assume that the transaction costs of collusion are lower for governors who are native or have been in office longer. We find that given decentralization, death rates are about 100% higher in provinces where the governor in charge of coalmine safety is a native or has been in office longer than average.

Keywords: decentralization, collusion, public bads