Chinese imports and exports grew rapidly during the first three decades of the twentieth century as China opened up to global trade. Using a new data set on the factor-intensity of traded goods at the industry level, we show that Chinese exports became more unskilled-intensive and imports became...

Our paper provides a comparative perspective on the development of public primary education in four of the largest developing economies circa 1910: Brazil, Russia, India and China (BRIC). These four countries encompassed more than 50 percent of the world's population in 1910, but remarkably few...

To what degree were Chinese financial markets integrated with the rest of the world prior to the 1949 Revolution and to what extent was the Chinese foreign exchange market efficient during this period? We estimate silver points for the Shanghai market from 1905 to 1933 to answer these questions....

This paper exploits a tax reform on manufacturing firms in China to study the impact of taxes on firm innovation. The reform switched the corporate income tax collection from the local to the state tax bureau and reduced the effective tax rate by 10%. The reform only applied to firms established...

We aim to quantify the role of social networks in job-related migration. With over 130 million rural labors migrating to the city each year, China is experiencing the largest internal migration in the human history. Using instrumental variables in the 2006 China Agricultural Census, we find that...

We report results from a large randomized natural field experiment conducted in southwestern China in the context of insurance for sows. Our study sheds light on two important questions about microinsurance. First, how does access to formal insurance affect farmers' production decisions? Second,...

We present results about the effects of observing others' choices, called observational learning, on individuals' behavior and subjective well-being in the context of restaurant dining from a randomized natural field experiment. Our experimental design aims to distinguish observational learning...

To prepare for the 2008 Olympic Games, China adopted a number of radical measures to improve air quality. Using officially reported air pollution index (API) from 2000 to 2009, we show that these measures improved the API of Beijing during and after the Games, but 60% of the effect faded away by...

Raw data suggest that enrolling in NCMS is associated with better school enrollment and lower mortality of young children and pregnant women. However, using a difference-in-difference propensity score method, we find most of these differences are driven by the endogenous introduction and take-up...

We study the causal effect of school curricula on students' stated beliefs and attitudes. We exploit a major textbook reform in China that was rolled out between 2004 and 2010 with the explicit intention of shaping youths' ideology. To measure its effect, we present evidence from a novel survey...