讲座主题：Spatial Structural Changes and the Marriage Market

主讲嘉宾：黄子彬 上海财经大学商学院副教授

讲座时间：2025年9月24日周三14:00-16:00

讲座地点：沙河校区二教215教室

嘉宾简介：黄子彬，上海财经大学商学院副教授，美国罗切斯特大学(University of Rochester)经济系博士，主要研究领域包括劳动经济学，教育经济学与城市经济学。黄子彬老师长期关注中国的城镇化、人口流动与流动家庭子女教育问题，研究成果被LabourEconomics，Journal of Development Economics，Journal of Comparative Economics，《世界经济》等期刊接收，并有多篇工作论文在International Economic Review，Quantitative Economics等一流国际学术期刊R&R。主持国家自然科学基金青年项目、阿里巴巴集团活水计划研究课题等项目。

内容摘要：Marriage and fertility are declining globally. We study the impact of spatial structural changes on marriage matching and quantify their aggregate implications for national marriage rates.Using data from China, we first present stylized facts on the joint patterns of dramatic gender-biased spatial structural changes, persistent marital social norms, and the diverging spatial distribution of singlehood characterized by a highsingles rate for females (males) in more (less) developed cities.We then build a prefecture-level spatial equilibrium model with multi-sector and multi-skill production, migration, and local marriage markets. The model reveals that, without gender-specific spatial structural changes, the singles rate would be 30% lower for average women and over 50% lower for college-educated women.The key mechanism is that spatial structural changes lead more highly educated women to sort into the service sector in moredeveloped cities than men. However, social norms remain persistent, particularly the strong preference for hypergamy. This results in more failed marriage matches for females (males) in more (less) developed cities, thereby lowering the national marriage rate.Counterfactual analysis shows that subsidizing marriage is costly and relatively ineffective amid continuing gender-specific spatial structuralchanges.

本讲座由中央财经大学2025年专题学术讲座资助计划和青年科研创新团队支持。