The power of securing property rights: Evidence from China's land titling program

Le Wen
2022 unpublished
We develop a theoretical model to study the impact of the land titling program on land transfer, labor allocation, and agricultural production costs in rural China. The empirical models using difference-in-difference (DID) and difference-in-difference-in-difference (DDD) designs test theoretical assertions advanced in the paper. The data used in the paper come from a nationally representative household survey dataset collected in 2013, 2015, and 2017. Results show that land titling increases
more » ... d transfer significantly, and the magnitude of this increase is about 6.36 percentage points. In particular, titled households with idle land, surplus labor, or low agricultural profit are more likely to transfer-out their land. Besides, land titling shifts rural laborers out of the agricultural sector and increases the migrant ratio in rural households. Finally, land titling decreases agricultural costs per unit of agricultural products by about 8.11%. Results have implications for land titling reform in China as well as elsewhere in the world.
doi:10.22004/ag.econ.322217 fatcat:lqb4id2wafezhnptrgbimzapmy