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Politics, and Bubbles

Paper Session

Saturday, Jan. 5, 2019 2:30 PM - 4:30 PM

Hilton Atlanta, 217
Hosted By: American Real Estate and Urban Economics Association
  • Chair: Yongheng Deng, University of Wisconsin-Madison

Political Connections and Credit Allocations: Evidence from China’s State-owned Enterprises in Urban Land Market

Wang Long
,
ShanghaiTech University
Yang Yang
,
Chinese University of Hong Kong

Abstract

This study examines the underlying mechanisms that drive the price premiums State-owned Enterprises (SOEs) pay at land auctions using a comprehensive and representative dataset of 316,320 transactions of land use rights from 2000 to 2016 in approximately 2,300 counties of urban China. We find that the SOEs paid 9.65% more than their Private-owned Enterprises (POEs) counterparts for comparable land parcels at auctions, and the land quality can largely explain the price premiums SOEs pay. In addition, SOEs’ soft budget constraint enables them to overbid for the lands they desire, and SOEs even bid higher prices for land after the Economic Stimulus program. Lastly, we show that SOEs’ monetary wealth and political connections crowd out POEs in areas with quality land.

Local Political Chief Turnover and Economic Growth: Evidences from China

Jing Wu
,
Tsinghua University
Keyang Li
,
Tsinghua University
Hao Li
,
Tsinghua University

Abstract

It is widely believed that the rotation and promotion system of local political chiefs plays an important role in China’s economic miracle. In this paper, however, we focus on the potential cost of the inherent frequent local chief turnovers. Based on a new manually-collected dataset on prefectural-level local chiefs between 1983 and 2012, the empirical results suggest that CCP chief turnover would lead to a 0.35 percentage points decrease of local GDP growth rate in the current year, and 0.23 percentage points decrease in the following year. This effect especially concentrates on government-controlled fields, such as investment, fiscal revenue and expenditure. We also provide evidences that the organization friction, especially the successor CCP chiefs’ familiarity with the city and the colleagues, is a major reason of such negative turnover effect.

Speculating on Superstition: Evidence from Housing Transactions in Hungry Ghost Months in Singapore

Tien Foo Sing
,
National University of Singapore
Sumit Agarwal
,
Georgetown University
Hyun-Soo Choi
,
Singapore Management University
Jia He
,
Nankai University

Abstract

This paper aims to study equilibrium outcomes of superstition and behaviors of superstitious and non-superstitious investors around the Hungry Ghost months in Singapore’s housing market. We find that superstitious Chinese homebuyers pay 1.41% lower in average per square meter price for houses bought in the Hungry Ghost month than houses bought outside the Hungry Ghost month, but within the same Western calendar year. We find that older Chinese aged above 40 years obtain larger price discounts relative to younger Chinese homebuyers and homebuyers of other ethnicity groups; and the results reflect a composition effect in the housing market. We find that young Chinese investors are non-superstitious, and are more likely to speculate on the Hungry Ghost effects than other ethnicity groups. However, their investment strategies of timing buy-and-sale activities around the Hungry Ghost month do not yield significant abnormal returns.

Spatial Estimates of Bubbles: Tokyo House Prices and Rents

Xiangyu Guo
,
Fudan University
Yongheng Deng
,
University of Wisconsin-Madison
Chihiro Shimizu
,
Nihon University
Daniel McMillen
,
University of Illinois

Abstract

"House sale and rental prices usually lie at the heart of the growing literature examining house price bubbles. In these studies, time series price-to-rent ratios are most commonly used. However, the characteristics of houses on sale and rental units are different and exhibit spatial variations. In this paper, we spatial estimates of house prices and rents, based on the locally weighted quantile approach and the decomposition. The geographic quantile version of locally weighted regressions can
place greater weight on observations closer to the target point, which produces unique quantile coefficients for each observation. This approach allows the distribution of predicted values to vary smoothly over space. Based on a spatial version of decomposition, the counterfactual prediction of price-to-rent ratio is estimated for each individual unit. The methodology is applied to a large sample of condominium sale and rent micro level data in Tokyo over 1986-2016, which covers the greatest bubble of the Japanese market. The results show large variation in price-to-rent ratio
over time and space. The estimated spatial price-to-rent ratios are higher in large and new units."
Discussant(s)
Teng Li
,
National University of Singapore
Wei Huang
,
National University of Singapore
Tse-Chun Lin
,
University of Hong Kong
Christian Redfearn
,
University of Southern California
JEL Classifications
  • R1 - General Regional Economics
  • D9 - Micro-Based Behavioral Economics