Hu, Wenhao

2020
Jing Cao, Mun S. Ho, and Wenhao Hu. 2020. “Analyzing carbon price policies using a general equilibrium model with household energy demand functions.” In Measuring Economic Growth and Productivity: Foundations, KLEMS Production Models, and Extensions, edited by Barbara Fraumeni. Cambridge, MA: Academic Press. Publisher's VersionAbstract

Multi-sector general equilibrium models are used to simulate the effects of environmental policies on industry output and consumption at disaggregated levels. The specification of household demand in such models often use simpler forms such as CES or Linear Expenditure Systems since there are few estimates of more flexible systems. We estimate a 2-stage translog utility function that explicitly accounts for detailed energy expenditures to allow us to capture the price and income effects more accurately than these simpler forms. We incorporate this into a China growth model to simulate the effects of a carbon price to achieve the government targets for the Climate Change (Paris) agreements.

Final Manuscript in DASH.
An edited volume dedicated to Prof. Dale W. Jorgenson by his students and collaborators.

Jing Cao, Mun S. Ho, Wenhao Hu, and Dale Jorgenson. 2020. “Effective labor supply and growth outlook in China.” China Economic Review, 61, June, Pp. 101398. Publisher's VersionAbstract
The falling projections of working-age population in China has led to predictions of much slower economic growth. We consider three mechanisms that could contribute to higher effective labor supply growth – further improvement in educational attainment due to cohort replacement and rising college enrollment, improvement in aggregate labor quality due to urbanization, and higher labor force participation due to later retirement. We find that these factors result in a projected growth rate of effective labor input of 0.40% for 2015-2030 compared to -0.60% for working age population. As a result, the projected growth rate of GDP will be 5.80% for 2015-2030 compared to 5.23% if these factors are ignored.
Jing Cao, Mun S. Ho, Wenhao Hu, and Dale W. Jorgensen. 2020. “Estimating flexible consumption functions for urban and rural households in China.” China Economic Review, 61, June, Pp. 101453. Publisher's VersionAbstract

There are few comprehensive studies of household consumption in China due to data restrictions. This prevents the calculation of inequality indices based on consumption. Secondly, this makes a comprehensive analysis of policies that affect consumption difficult; economy-wide models used for analysis often have to employ simple consumption forms with unit income elasticities. We estimate a translog demand system distinguished by demographic characteristics, giving price and income elasticities that should be useful for policy analysis. We estimate separate functions for urban and rural households using household expenditure data and detailed commodity prices (1995-2006). This allows future analysis of social welfare and inequality based on consumption to supplement existing studies based on income. To illustrate an application of the model, we project consumption composition based on projected prices, incomes and demographic changes – aging, education improvement and urbanization.

Jing Cao, Mun S Ho, Wenhao Hu, and Dale W Jorgenson. 2020. “Urban household consumption in China: price, income and demographic effects.” Review of Development Economics, 152, 25 October, Pp. 810-833. Publisher's Version
2019
Jing Cao, Mun S Ho, and Wenhao Hu. 2019. “Energy consumption of urban households in China.” China Economic Review, 58, 101343. Publisher's VersionAbstract
We estimate China urban household energy demand as part of a complete system of consumption demand so that it can be used in economy-wide models. This allows us to derive cross-price elasticities unlike studies which focus on one type of energy. We implement a two-stage approach and explicitly account for electricity, domestic fuels and transportation demand in the first stage and gasoline, coal, LPG and gas demand in the second stage. We find income inelastic demand for electricity and home energy, but the elasticity is higher than estimates in the rich countries. Demand for total transportation is income elastic. The price elasticity for electricity is estimated to be −0.5 and in the range of other estimates for China, and similar to long-run elasticities estimated for the U.S.