《World Development》| He et al：农村低保项目提高农村儿童教育成果

 摘要：为解决农村贫困问题，中国政府设立了“农村低保”无条件现金转移项目。许多研究调查了这一计划对农村家庭的影响，结果却喜忧参半。有趣的是，尽管教育在打破贫困循环方面很重要，但农村低保对农村儿童教育的影响却鲜为人知。本研究首先考察农村低保对农村儿童学习成果的影响，探讨农村低保与学习成果之间的因果关系，然后探讨其可能的机制和异质性分析。使用2010年、2012年和2014年中国家庭面板研究(CFPS)的数据。研究结果表明，农村低保项目存在较高的定位误差，但仍然有效(即项目转移总体上还是针对有需要的人)。固定效应模型发现，项目参与提高了农村儿童在语文和数学考试中的标准化考试成绩。在机制分析中发现，教育和食品支出的增加似乎将农村低保的参与和学习成果的增加联系起来。异质性分析显示，贫穷的非东部儿童从该计划中受益(而其他儿童没有影响)。这些发现表明，农村低保的参与促进了农村孩子的学习，这可能表明了长期的反贫困效应，如果该项目能够解决针对性的问题，效果可能会更大。

关键词：教育 ；低保；影响评价；中国农村

Abstract:In order to combat poverty in China’s rural areas, the Chinese government has established an unconditional cash transfer program known as the Rural Minimum Living Standard Guarantee (Rural Dibao) Program. Many studies have investigated the program’s effect on rural households, only to come back with mixed findings. Interestingly, despite the importance of education in breaking cycles of poverty, little is known about Rural Dibao’s impact on rural children’s education. This study investigates Rural Dibao’s impact on rural children’s learning outcomes by first examining targeting issues within the program, exploring a causal relationship between Rural Dibao and learning outcomes, and then exploring potential mechanisms and heterogeneous effects. Data from China Family Panel Studies (CFPS) from the years 2010, 2012 and 2014 were used. The results suggest that the Rural Dibao program suffers from high levels of targeting error, yet is still effective (i.e. program transfers generally still go to people in need). The fixed effects models find that program participation raises rural children’s standardized test scores in CFPS Chinese-language and math tests. In investigating mechanisms, increased education and food expenditures seem to connect Rural Dibao participation to increased learning results. The heterogeneity analysis shows that poorer, non-eastern children benefit from the program (while others have no effect). These findings suggest that Rural Dibao participation boosts rural children’s learning, which could indicate a long-term anti-poverty effect, and that if the program can resolve targeting problems, this effect could be even greater.

Key words: Education; Low income subsidy; Impact evaluation; Rural China

《World Development》最新影响因子为3.92，该期刊是发展经济学领域的顶级学术期刊，在JCR分区中处于经济学领域一区（Q1），属于经济学影响因子前5%期刊。 

原文链接：

https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.1108/CAER-05-2020-0085/full/html

————END