Faculty of Finance, City University of Macau, Macau, China.
Postal Saving Bank of China, Zhejiang, China.
PLoS One. 2023 Aug 4;18(8):e0288966. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0288966. eCollection 2023.
This study aims to reveal short-run and long-run asymmetries among human capital, educational inequality, and income inequality in China over the period 1975-2020 using a nonlinear autoregressive distributed lag (NARDL) model. The estimated long-run asymmetry parameters reflect that positive shocks to secondary education (SSE) and higher education (HE) are negatively correlated with income Gini coefficient. The adverse shocks of secondary education (SSE) and higher education (HE) stimulate the Gini coefficient of income, but the effect of secondary education (SSE) on the Gini coefficient of income is not significant, while that of higher education (HE) is significant. The results also highlight that, in the long run, there is a significant asymptotic effect of the education Gini coefficient (educational inequality) and economic growth on the income Gini coefficient (income inequality). However, physical capital stock has a significant adverse effect on income inequality in the long run. Higher education significantly promotes educational inequality, while the square of higher education significantly reduces educational inequality, thus verifying the inverted U-shaped Kuznets curve hypothesis between higher education and educational inequality. Strategically, this study suggests higher education as a powerful tool for mitigating income inequality by emphasizing educational equity.
本研究旨在利用非线性自回归分布滞后（NARDL）模型，揭示 1975 年至 2020 年间中国人力资本、教育不平等和收入不平等之间的短期和长期非对称性。估计的长期非对称参数反映出，中等教育（SSE）和高等教育（HE）的正冲击与收入基尼系数呈负相关。中等教育（SSE）和高等教育（HE）的负冲击刺激了收入的基尼系数，但中等教育（SSE）对收入基尼系数的影响并不显著，而高等教育（HE）的影响则显著。研究结果还强调，从长期来看，教育基尼系数（教育不平等）和经济增长对收入基尼系数（收入不平等）存在显著的渐近效应。然而，物质资本存量对收入不平等存在长期的显著负向影响。高等教育对教育不平等有显著的促进作用，而高等教育的平方对教育不平等有显著的降低作用，从而验证了高等教育与教育不平等之间存在倒 U 型库兹涅茨曲线假说。从战略上讲，本研究建议将高等教育作为通过强调教育公平来缓解收入不平等的有力工具。
