This is the cover page of Ling Yao's job market paper. Title: Agricultural Mechanization and Structural Transformation. Author: Ling Yao. Keywords: Agricultural mechanization; structural transformation; gender; shift-share instrumental variable. Abstract: This paper measures the effect of subsidized agricultural mechanization on non-agricultural employment. Combining provincial agricultural machinery subsidy catalogs with purchase records in China, I construct city-level exposure to the subsidy as a shift-share instrument for mechanization. I find no support for the hypothesis that agricultural mechanization pushes labor into non-agricultural sectors in the local area or in migration destinations. Individual-level analysis further reveals that in more mechanized areas men return to agriculture while women withdraw from non-agricultural jobs without participating more in farming. This study informs policymakers that while promoting agricultural mechanization improves labor productivity in farming, it contributes little to accelerating structural transformation, and that it leads to the unintended consequence of reinforcing gender-based labor-market disparities.
Hi all,
I am Ling Yao, a PhD candidate in Applied Econ at the U of Minnesota. I work on the intersection of agriculture and development.
My #EconJMP shows surprising labor outcomes of agricultural mechanization and reveals gender disparities in technological change.
👉 lingyao314.github.io