题目: Winter is Coming: Early-life Experiences and Politicians’ Decisions

讲座人:梁平汉 教授；中山大学 政治与公共事务管理学院

主持人: 张彤 副教授

时间: 2018年11月8日（周四）  14:00-15:00

地点:华南农业大学经管学院大楼 602室

讲座人简介:梁平汉，中山大学政治与公共事务管理学院教授，博士生导师，中山大学中国公共管理研究中心研究员。主要研究领域：地方政府行为、博弈论、政治经济学、行为与实验经济学。在Games and Economic Behavior, Journal of Comparative Economics, 《经济研究》、《管理世界》、《经济学（季刊）》等国内外一流期刊发表论文多篇；获霍英东基金会高等院校优秀青年教师奖；主持国家自科基金课题、国家社科专项重大子课题等。

Abstract: The preferences of politicians matter in policy-making. This paper focuses on the role of local politicians’ early-life experiences in their policy decisions in office. We exploit China’s Great Famine from 1959 to 1961 as a natural experiment and examine its impact on the fiscal decisions of the county Party secretaries (CPS) who experienced it in their early childhoods. We construct a data set that matches the biographical information of 2,831 CPS with fiscal data of 1,715 counties during 1993-2007. The results indicate that if the CPS experienced a severer famine which decreased their origin county’s agricultural population by 10% more during early childhoods, other things being equal, they will increase fiscal expenditure on agriculture by 6.8% and increase expenditure on social security by 10.6%. In addition, a 10% severer famine in early childhood decreases agricultural tax by 38.8% and value-added tax by 5.6%. As a result, the early-life experience of famine has further impact on local development, leading to more food production and employment in agriculture sector. A back-of-envelope calculation suggests that the influences on agriculture in China are substantial. Furthermore, we investigate the channels of famine impact. We exploit a household survey data with a focus on Communist Party members and show that early-life famine experiences change their relevant attitudes significantly. We also provide evidence that famine experience takes effect through forming the policy preference for agricultural development, rather than the belief about future famine.