晚清中国的新旧教育类型与地区经济发展

基于历史教育事件构造自然实验是识别教育与经济发展之间因果关系的前沿方法,随之而来的教育多样性问题却没有引起实证研究者的足够重视。本研究在晚清中国多种教育形式并存且新旧教育过渡的背景下,使用教育发展情况在时期上和地区间的双重差异构建实证策略,进而比较不同教育类型对近代经济发展的效应。结果显示：相比于传统的儒家官学和外来的教会学校,新式学堂的经济促进作用更为明显;不同教育类型在高素质劳动力供给上的差异是出现这种结果的重要原因;然而,三类教育只能提高经济水平而无法提升经济增速。这些发现强调了教育的实用性和世俗化对于现代经济的重要性,也指出发展中国家在现代化初期需要着力应对学校教育“技术含量不高”的问题。

Traditional and Modern Education Types and Regional Economic Development in Late Qing China

Constructing natural experiments based on historical educational events is a cutting-edge method to identify causal relationships between education and economic development, but the ensuing issue of educational diversity has not received sufficient attention from empirical researchers. In the context of the coexistence of multiple forms of education and the transition between traditional and modern education in late Qing China, this study constructs an empirical strategy using both period and regional differences in educational development to compare the effects of different types of education on modern economic development. The results show that the economic contribution of the modern schools was more pronounced than that of the traditional Confucian governmental schools and foreign mission schools; the difference in the supply of high-quality labor force between different education types is an important reason for this result; however, all three types of education could only raise the economic level but not the economic growth rate. These findings underscore the importance of the practical and secular nature of education for the modern economy, and point to the need for developing countries to address the "low technical content" of schooling in the early stages of modernization.